Word.ws English Dictionary

kgosi

kgosi noun: a tribal chief among the Tswana people of southern Africa.

Noun

kgosi (plural kgosis or dikgosi)

  1. A tribal chief among the Tswana people of southern Africa.
    • Then Rasebolai said that, as was customary, he would ask the visiting dikgosi to speak.2006, Susan Williams, Colour Bar, Penguin, published 2007, page 295
    • Botswana National Front President, Otsweletse Moupo said he had no doubt that Motshidisi would serve the Palapye community well as kgosi.2007, Mmegi, 1 Jun 07

Forms of kgosi

pluralkgosis
pluraldikgosi

Origin of kgosi

Borrowed from Tswana kgosi (“chief, chieftain; king”), from Proto-Bantu *nkócì (“lion”). Doublet of inkosi.

Questions about kgosi

What does kgosi mean?
Kgosi means a tribal chief among the Tswana people of southern Africa.
What part of speech is kgosi?
Kgosi is a noun.
What is the plural of kgosi?
The plural of kgosi is kgosis.

Words near kgosi in the dictionary

  1. KGC
  2. KGD
  3. KGM
  4. Kgn
  5. kgosana
  6. kgosi
  7. kgosis
  8. kgotla
  9. kgotlas
  10. kgps
  11. kgs

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: kgosi (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “kgosi.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/kgosi. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.