Negus

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A warm sweetened beverage of port or sherry mixed with hot water, lemon and spices ; a traditional title meaning king used for the former emperor of Ethiopia
2. A heated mixture of wine, hot water, sugar, citrus and spices served warm ; the royal title borne by the rulers of Ethiopia in earlier centuries
3. A spiced hot drink made from fortified wine, sugar and lemon ; a ruling title historically given to the Ethiopian monarch, meaning king

Etymology: The drink is named after a man, Colonel Francis Negus (1670–1732), who is usually credited with inventing it. The mixture of port or sherry, hot water, sugar, lemon and nutmeg was his creation, and the name stuck to it as a tribute to its maker. The word itself has a much older and more distant history. It traces back to the Ge'ez word "nəguś", meaning "king" or "ruler", from the verb "nägśä", "to rule". Ge'ez was the classical language of Ethiopia, and the same root gave the Amharic word for king, which is where English got the term. Its first recorded use in English dates to around the 1590s, so the title of an African monarch was already in circulation in Britain long before a colonel attached it to a glass of wine.