Chiliarch is a

military rank Military ranks is a system of hierarchy, hierarchical relationships within armed forces, police, Intelligence agency, intelligence agencies, paramilitary groups, and other institutions organized along military organisation , military lines, such ...

dating back to antiquity. Originally denoting the commander of a unit of about one thousand men (a chiliarchy) in the Macedonian army, it was subsequently used as a Greek translation of a Persian officer who functioned as a kind of

vizier A vizier (; ; ) is a high-ranking political advisor or Minister (government), minister in the Near East. The Abbasids, Abbasid caliphs gave the title ''wazir'' to a minister formerly called ''katib'' (secretary), who was at first merely a help ...

and of the

Roman army The Roman army () served ancient Rome and the Roman people, enduring through the Roman Kingdom (753–509 BC), the Roman Republic (509–27 BC), and the Roman Empire (27 BC–AD 1453), including the Western Roman Empire (collapsed Fall of the W ...

military tribune A military tribune () was an officer of the Roman army who ranked below the legate and above the centurion. Young men of Equestrian rank often served as military tribunes as a stepping stone to the Senate. The should not be confused with the ...

s. It has subsequently been used for other similar ranks and positions in other

armed forces A military, also known collectively as armed forces, is a heavily armed, highly organized force primarily intended for warfare. Militaries are typically authorized and maintained by a sovereign state, with their members identifiable by a ...

Name

The English term ''chiliarch'' was borrowed from

Latin Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...

, a transcription of Greek ''khilíarkhos'' () and ''khiliárkhēs'' (), both meaning "commander of a thousand". The name has also occasionally been written as chiliarcha, chiliarchus,. or chiliarchos or

calque In linguistics, a calque () or loan translation is a word or phrase borrowed from another language by literal word-for-word or root-for-root translation. When used as a verb, "to calque" means to borrow a word or phrase from another language ...

d as thousandman. The chiliad or chiliarchy controlled by a chiliarch derives from Latin , from Greek ''khiliarkhía'' ().

Ancient Macedon and Persia

In the Ancient Macedonian army, a chiliarch was the commander of a 1024-strong chiliarchy or "order" of the and the hypaspists heavy infantry, subdivided into 64 files () of 16 men each. At the same time, officers known as pentakosiarchs ("commanders of 500") are also mentioned alongside the chiliarchs under both

Alexander the Great Alexander III of Macedon (; 20/21 July 356 BC – 10/11 June 323 BC), most commonly known as Alexander the Great, was a king of the Ancient Greece, ancient Greek kingdom of Macedonia (ancient kingdom), Macedon. He succeeded his father Philip ...

and in the Ptolemaic armies, apparently as subordinate officers. In addition, the title of chiliarch was used as the Greek equivalent of the Achaemenid title (also transliterated ). The Achaemenid army was organized on a decimal basis, and the was the commander of the (, "apple-bearers"), the 1,000-strong personal bodyguard of the Achaemenid kings. The latter often played a role analogous to that of a majordomo or

in later times. The Persian office was in turn adopted by Alexander the Great, and first awarded to Hephaestion and after Hephaestion's death to Perdiccas. Likewise, Antipater shortly before his death named Polyperchon as , but then named his own son Cassander as chiliarch, and thereby "second in authority" according to

Diodorus Siculus Diodorus Siculus or Diodorus of Sicily (; 1st century BC) was an ancient Greece, ancient Greek historian from Sicily. He is known for writing the monumental Universal history (genre), universal history ''Bibliotheca historica'', in forty ...

(XVIII.48.4–5). This Persian-inspired office did not survive into subsequent

Hellenistic In classical antiquity, the Hellenistic period covers the time in Greek history after Classical Greece, between the death of Alexander the Great in 323 BC and the death of Cleopatra VII in 30 BC, which was followed by the ascendancy of the R ...

practice. However, it was revived by later Iranian dynasties: while its existence in the

Parthian Empire The Parthian Empire (), also known as the Arsacid Empire (), was a major Iranian political and cultural power centered in ancient Iran from 247 BC to 224 AD. Its latter name comes from its founder, Arsaces I, who led the Parni tribe ...

is unclear, it was certainly in existence in the 3rd

century A century is a period of 100 years or 10 decades. Centuries are numbered ordinally in English and many other languages. The word ''century'' comes from the Latin ''centum'', meaning ''one hundred''. ''Century'' is sometimes abbreviated as c. ...

under the

Sasanian Empire The Sasanian Empire (), officially Eranshahr ( , "Empire of the Iranian peoples, Iranians"), was an List of monarchs of Iran, Iranian empire that was founded and ruled by the House of Sasan from 224 to 651. Enduring for over four centuries, th ...

(

Middle Persian Middle Persian, also known by its endonym Pārsīk or Pārsīg ( Inscriptional Pahlavi script: , Manichaean script: , Avestan script: ) in its later form, is a Western Middle Iranian language which became the literary language of the Sasania ...

: or ). According to the 5th-century Armenian historian Elishe, it was equivalent to or

prime minister A prime minister or chief of cabinet is the head of the cabinet and the leader of the ministers in the executive branch of government, often in a parliamentary or semi-presidential system. A prime minister is not the head of state, but r ...

. From Persian, the term also passed into Armenian as and .

Roman and Byzantine Empires

Later Greek authors employed the term chiliarch for the Roman

s, with the in particular rendered (). In the

Byzantine Empire The Byzantine Empire, also known as the Eastern Roman Empire, was the continuation of the Roman Empire centred on Constantinople during late antiquity and the Middle Ages. Having survived History of the Roman Empire, the events that caused the ...

, the title was used as a more scholarly alternative to the rank of , chiefly in literary works, while in the later 10th century it became once more a technical term when Nikephoros II Phokas instituted 1,000-strong units termed or and commanded by a or .

Ancient Rus

A chiliarch, in Russian (), was a military leader in

Kievan Rus' Kievan Rus', also known as Kyivan Rus,. * was the first East Slavs, East Slavic state and later an amalgam of principalities in Eastern Europe from the late 9th to the mid-13th century.John Channon & Robert Hudson, ''Penguin Historical At ...

who commanded a people's volunteer army called a (, or a thousand). In the Novgorod Republic, the chiliarch evolved into a judicial or commercial official and was elected from

boyars A boyar or bolyar was a member of the highest rank of the Feudalism, feudal nobility in many Eastern European states, including First Bulgarian Empire, Bulgaria, Kievan Rus' (and later Russian nobility, Russia), Boyars of Moldavia and Wallach ...

at a

veche A ''veche'' was a popular assembly during the Middle Ages. The ''veche'' is mentioned during the times of Kievan Rus' and it later became a powerful institution in Russian cities such as Veliky Novgorod, Novgorod and Pskov, where the ''veche'' a ...

for a period of one year. Like the posadniks in Novgorod, the office was often held by one man for several years in a row and he was often succeeded by his son or another close relative, indicating that the office was held within clans and was not fully elective. In cities with no veche, chiliarchies were appointed by the

knyaz A , also , ''knjaz'' or (), is a historical Slavs, Slavic title, used both as a royal and noble title in different times. It is usually translated into English language, English as 'prince', 'king' or 'duke', depending on specific historical c ...

or prince from among the noble boyars and could hand down their post to their sons. In the Novgorod Republic, chiliarchs were considered representatives of ordinary ("black") people. Along with the role as military leaders, they were also supposed to supervise the city fortifications, convene veches, act as ambassadors and as judges in the commercial courts. Like the posadniks, in the 14th century the former chiliarchs maintained considerable political influence and privileges and were known as "Old Chiliarchs". The earliest documented chiliarch of Novgorod was Putyata. Grand Prince

Dmitry Donskoy Dmitry Ivanovich Donskoy (; 12 October 1350 – 19 May 1389) was Prince of Moscow from 1359 and Grand Prince of Vladimir from 1363 until his death. He was the heir of Ivan II. He was the first prince of Moscow to openly challenge Mongol ...

, after the death of Vassily Vassilyevich Velyaminov in 1374, abolished the post, replacing it with voyevodas and

namestnik A viceroy () is an official who reigns over a polity in the name of and as the representative of the monarch of the territory. The term derives from the Latin prefix ''vice-'', meaning "in the place of" and the Anglo-Norman ''roy'' (Old Frenc ...

s. The chiliarch in Novgorod was abolished when Grand Prince Ivan III of Moscow conquered the city in 1478. It was abolished in Pskov in 1510 when Vasily III of Russia took that city.

Modern Greece

The title was once again revived during the

Greek War of Independence The Greek War of Independence, also known as the Greek Revolution or the Greek Revolution of 1821, was a successful war of independence by Greek revolutionaries against the Ottoman Empire between 1821 and 1829. In 1826, the Greeks were assisted ...

. In January 1822, the First National Assembly at Epidaurus decided to create an organizational framework for the irregular troops of the various independent war leaders, and instituted a number of chiliarchies (), each composed of ten centuries () of a hundred men under a hecatontarch (, ). Each chiliarchy was commanded by a chiliarch, with a small staff comprising a deputy chiliarch (, ), a subaltern known as , a physician, a surgeon, a quartermaster and a priest. In 1828, the chiliarchies were reorganized and reduced to three, each now comprising two pentakosiarchies () of five centuries each, comprising 1120 men in total. Each chiliarch had a small staff comprising an adjutant, a secretary, a priest, a doctor, a paymaster and a quartermaster, while a flag bearer and a trumpeter were allocated to each pentakosiarchy. The 1828-model chiliarchies were abolished after the Battle of Petra in July 1829, and thirteen light infantry battalions () formed instead.

Hungary

The Hungarian rank of '' ezredes'', literally "of a thousand", is the modern, commonly used abbreviation of the obsolete term of ''ezereskapitány'', literally "captain of a thousand". (The term ''ezereskapitány'' was used in the

War of the Spanish Succession The War of the Spanish Succession was a European great power conflict fought between 1701 and 1714. The immediate cause was the death of the childless Charles II of Spain in November 1700, which led to a struggle for control of the Spanish E ...

(1701–1714), the ''ezredes'' has been used since the

Revolutions of 1848 The revolutions of 1848, known in some countries as the springtime of the peoples or the springtime of nations, were a series of revolutions throughout Europe over the course of more than one year, from 1848 to 1849. It remains the most widespre ...

.) An ''ezredes'' is the leader of a

regiment A regiment is a military unit. Its role and size varies markedly, depending on the country, military service, service, or administrative corps, specialisation. In Middle Ages, Medieval Europe, the term "regiment" denoted any large body of l ...

(about 1000–1500 men in

Hungary Hungary is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Spanning much of the Pannonian Basin, Carpathian Basin, it is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine to the northeast, Romania to the east and southeast, Serbia to the south, Croatia and ...

) and this rank is equivalent to the rank of

colonel Colonel ( ; abbreviated as Col., Col, or COL) is a senior military Officer (armed forces), officer rank used in many countries. It is also used in some police forces and paramilitary organizations. In the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries, a colon ...

major Major most commonly refers to: * Major (rank), a military rank * Academic major, an academic discipline to which an undergraduate student formally commits * People named Major, including given names, surnames, nicknames * Major and minor in musi ...

. The term ''ezredes'' is used by the Hungarian army (officially the

Hungarian Defence Force The Hungarian Defence Forces (, ) is the national armed forces, defence force of Hungary. Since 2007, the Hungarian Armed Forces has been under a unified command structure. The Ministry of Defence maintains political and civil control over the ar ...

) and police force too.

Turkey

The Turkish rank of '' binbaşı'', literally "head of a thousand", is equivalent to the Commonwealth and US rank of

Major Major most commonly refers to: * Major (rank), a military rank * Academic major, an academic discipline to which an undergraduate student formally commits * People named Major, including given names, surnames, nicknames * Major and minor in musi ...

Israel

An aluf ( "chilliarch") is the term used in the

Israel Defense Forces The Israel Defense Forces (IDF; , ), alternatively referred to by the Hebrew-language acronym (), is the national military of the State of Israel. It consists of three service branches: the Israeli Ground Forces, the Israeli Air Force, and ...

(IDF) for officers who in other countries would have the rank of

general A general officer is an Officer (armed forces), officer of high rank in the army, armies, and in some nations' air force, air and space forces, marines or naval infantry. In some usages, the term "general officer" refers to a rank above colone ...

, air marshal, or

admiral Admiral is one of the highest ranks in many navies. In the Commonwealth nations and the United States, a "full" admiral is equivalent to a "full" general in the army or the air force. Admiral is ranked above vice admiral and below admiral of ...

. There are five chiliarch ranks, constituting the five highest ranks in the IDF. The term ''aluf'' comes from a

Semitic root The roots of verbs and most nouns in the Semitic languages are characterized as a sequence of consonants or " radicals" (hence the term consonantal root). Such abstract consonantal roots are used in the formation of actual words by adding the vowel ...

meaning "thousand", making an ''aluf'' the one who commands a thousand people. The

(IDF) is an integrated force, ranks are the same in all services. *Chief chiliarch, ''Rav aluf'' (): the highest rank in IDF *Chiliarch, ''Aluf'' *Sub-chiliairch, Tat aluf'' () *Secondary chiliarch, ''Aluf mishne'' () *Deputy chilairch, ''Sgan aluf'' ()