Kanasubigi

Kanasubigi, possibly read as Kanas Ubigi or Kanas U Bigi was a title of the early rulers of the Bulgars.

The title khan for early Bulgar rulers is an assumed one, as only the form kanasubigi or "kanasybigi"^[1] is attested in stone inscriptions. Historians presume that it includes the title khan in its archaic form kana, and there is a presumptive evidence suggesting that the latter title was indeed used in Bulgaria, e.g. the name of one of the Bulgars rulers Pagan occurs in Patriarch Nicephorus's so-called breviarium as Καμπαγάνος (Kampaganos), likely an erroneous rendition of the phrase "Kan Pagan".^[2] Among the proposed translations for the phrase kanasubigi as a whole are lord of the army, from the reconstructed Turkic phrase *sü begi, paralleling the attested Old Turkic sü baši,^[3] and, more recently, "(ruler) from God", from the Indo-European *su- and baga-, i.e. *su-baga (an equivallent of the Greek phrase ὁ ἐκ Θεοῦ ἄρχων, ho ek Theou archon, which is common in Bulgar inscriptions).^[4] This titulature presumably persisted until the Bulgars adopted Christianity.^[5] Some Bulgar inscriptions written in Greek and later in Slavonic refer to the Bulgarian ruler respectively with the Greek title archon or the Slavic title knyaz.^[6]

References

• Hanswilhelm Haefs, Das goldene Reich der Pamir-Bulgaren an Donau und Wardar (p. 120), ISBN 3-8334-2340-4