Shere Khan is a fictional tiger who appears in two of Rudyard Kipling's Jungle Book stories featuring Mowgli and their adaptations. The word Shere (or "shir") translates as "tiger" or "lion" in Persian, Urdu, and Punjabi, and Khan translates as "sovereign," "king", or "military leader", in a number of languages influenced by the Mongols, including Pashto.