A military commander or leader, especially a Cossack chief in Eastern Europe and Russia.
From German 'Hauptmann' (captain, literally 'head man'), borrowed into Russian and Polish. 'Haupt' means head and 'mann' means man.
Hetmen were so powerful that they could challenge tsars—these weren't just military commanders, they were elected leaders who represented frontier warriors' independence. Democracy had a strange and wild form in Cossack territory!
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