Word.ws English Dictionary

penghulu

penghulu noun: a local chief or governor in parts of Malaysia and Indonesia.

Noun

penghulu (plural penghulus)

  1. A local chief or governor in parts of Malaysia and Indonesia.
    • As soon as she graduated, Anwar Sadat dragged her and the classmate said to be responsible to a penghulu, who could officiate at the wedding.2015, Eka Kurniawan, translated by Labodalih Sembiring, Man Tiger, Verso, page 17
    • Outdated provisions such as the appointment of forest rangers and penghulus to carry out duties, which are no longer relevant to modern Singapore, will also be removed.2022 November 30, Rahayu Mahzam, “Second Reading Speech by Senior Parl Sec, Mdm Rahayu Mahzam, on State Lands Protection Bill”, in Ministry of Law (Singapore)

Forms of penghulu

pluralpenghulus

Origin of penghulu

Unadapted borrowing from Malay penghulu.

Questions about penghulu

What does penghulu mean?
Penghulu means a local chief or governor in parts of Malaysia and Indonesia.
What part of speech is penghulu?
Penghulu is a noun.
What is the plural of penghulu?
The plural of penghulu is penghulus.

Words near penghulu in the dictionary

  1. Pengelley
  2. Pengelly
  3. penger
  4. pengest
  5. Penghu
  6. penghulu
  7. penghulus
  8. Pengjia
  9. Penglai
  10. Penglai City
  11. Penglai Island

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: penghulu (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: “penghulu.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/penghulu. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.