The word Graf derives from Middle High German: grave, which is usually derived from Latin: graphio. Graphio is in turn thought to come from the Byzantine title grapheus, which ultimately derives from the Greek verb γρᾰ́φειν

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The comital title of Graf is common to various European territories where German was or is the official or vernacular tongue, including Austria, Germany, Switzerland, Luxembourg, Liechtenstein, Alsace, the Baltic states and other former Habsburg crown lands.

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A Reichsgraf was a nobleman whose title of count was conferred or confirmed by the Holy Roman Emperor, and meant "Imperial Count", i.e., a count of the Holy Roman Empire. Since the feudal era, any count whose territory lay within the Empire and was under the

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A Markgraf or Margrave was originally a military governor of a Carolingian "mark" (march), a border province. In medieval times the borders of the Holy Roman Empire were especially vulnerable to foreign attack, so the hereditary count of these "marches" of the

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A gefürsteter Graf (English: princely count) is a Reichsgraf who was recognised by the Holy Roman Emperor as bearing the higher rank or exercising the more extensive authority of an Imperial prince (Reichsfürst). While nominally retaining only a comital title, he was accorded

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A Burggraf, or Burgrave, was a 12th- and 13th-century military and civil judicial governor of a castle (compare castellan, custos, keeper) of the town it dominated and of its immediate surrounding countryside. His jurisdiction was a Burggrafschaft,

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A Landgraf or Landgrave was a nobleman of comital rank in feudal Germany whose jurisdiction stretched over a territory larger than usually held by a count within the Holy Roman Empire. The status of a landgrave was elevated, usually being associated with

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