A title bestowed upon an apprentice in the martial, athletic, or manual arts, literally translated as Lower Physical, the conjugated al-ga having a uniquely Iskan linguistic function as a Titular Adjective, an adjective that is not modified into or modifying a noun, used only in Title Case.
In the Early Iskan Age, the title referred to all of those who had taken apprenticeships in any physical disciplines under the mentorship of an al-gar, not only sport and warfare, but the manual occupations such as builders, land planners (agricultural and urban), cartographers (major and minor), smiths, jacks, miners, and at the time, alchemists.
From the Middle Age to the Modern Age, the title has since been used only to refer to apprentices in the military, athletic, and ludic disciplines. Despite the decline in prevalence of secular al-gar in Modern Iska (not to mention the Western and Southern Kingdoms), the title of al-gan has not lost its prominence in contemporary Iskan culture as the title has come to be applied more broadly to all amateur, beginner, or newly-initiated soldiers, athletes, and trainers regardless of their affiliation with a specific al-gar.
Traditionally, all al-gan were required to be males, either originarily or synthetically. While this remains true in all theological contexts, contemporary secularly affiliated al-gan can include female and zheld individuals. Certainly, this liberalization has aided the survival of the title, while al-gar becomes increasingly obsolete.
For this reason, the title holds much less esteem and cultural or ritualistic significance in contemporary Iska than it once did and than al-gar maintains, due of course, to the scarcity of the latter. In the West, however, the title continues to hold an exoticisized mystique among the youth and it is not uncommon to encounter young athletes, soldiers, or martial artists referring to themselves as al-gan far outsid eof Iska.