sherry

Etymology

It is a back-formation from English sherris, which was taken for a plural,^{[2][3][4][5][6]} or which lost its final -s in the phrase “sherris sack”.^[7][8] Sherris is from Spanish vino de Xeres (“wine of Xeres”),^[2][9][10] named after the town of Xeres, now Jerez de la Frontera, near Cadiz in Andalusia, where the wine was made.^[2][3][9] The English “sh” renders the old Spanish pronunciation of “x”, /ʃ/, since merged with that of “j”;^[2][6] in the 17th century the town's name itself appears in English as “Sherries”.^[2][11] Skeat, Weekley and Klein trace the town's name to the genitive of Latin Caesar, "(the town) of Caesar".^{[12][11][5][9]} Weekley and Merriam-Webster compare cherry and pea, formed in the same way.^[11][6]

Earliest recorded meaning

The still white wine made near Xeres: 1608, in Thomas Middleton's A Mad World, My Masters.^[2][3] Merriam-Webster dates the word to 1584,^[4] and the sherris it came from is recorded in Shakespeare's Henry IV, Part 2 (about 1597, printed 1600);^[3][2][6] Etymonline dates sherris to the 1530s.^[9]

Semantic evolution

In the 16th and 17th centuries several dry or sweetened white wines imported into England were called sack, and the one from around Xeres was “sherris sack”; reduced to sherry, the name was later applied to the fortified Spanish wine that bears it now.^[13][6] Falstaff praises sherris for warming the blood and giving courage,^[6][14] and Johnson (1755) still entered sherris, sherris sack and sherry together as a sweet Spanish wine.^[14] In modern use the name covers a class of fortified Spanish wines and similar wines made elsewhere.^[2][4] It was used in the names of mixed drinks such as sherry-and-bitters from 1870,^[2] for a glass of sherry from 1924, and for the small wine glass used for it from 1907.^[2] The verb, to add sherry to, is chiefly found in the adjective sherried (1970).^[2][7]

Timeline

• 1530s – sherris, according to Etymonline.^[9]
• 1584 – Merriam-Webster's first known use of sherry.^[4]
• c. 1597 – sherris, in Shakespeare's Henry IV, Part 2.^[3][6]
• 1608 – sherry, in Middleton's A Mad World, My Masters.^[2][3]
• 1870 – in the names of mixed drinks.^[2]
• 1907 – a small glass for sherry.^[2]
• 1924 – a glass or drink of sherry.^[2]
• 1970 – sherried, with sherry added.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. A fortified wine from the region of Jerez in southern Spain, ranging from very dry to sweet and pale to dark amber in colour, often drunk as an aperitif; also a similar wine made elsewhere.^[15][4][7]
2. A glass of this wine: We had a sherry before dinner.^[2][7]
3. A small wine glass of the kind used for sherry.^[2][7]

Related words

• sherris
• sack
• Caesar

Usage notes

A separate dialect and slang verb sherry, to scurry or run off, recorded from 1788 in Yorkshire and Lincolnshire, is perhaps a variant of sheer.^[2][7][16]

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
4. ^ a b c d e Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
5. ^ a b Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
6. ^ a b c d e f g Merriam-Webster's Book of Word Histories, Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
7. ^ a b c d e f Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
9. ^ a b c d e Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
10. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
11. ^ a b c Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
12. ^ Skeat, Walter W. (1911), A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, new ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
13. ^ Ayto, John (2005), Word Origins: The Secret Histories of English Words from A to Z, 2nd ed., London: A & C Black
14. ^ a b Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
15. ^ Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
16. ^ Wright, Joseph, ed. (1898–1905), The English Dialect Dictionary, 6 vols., Oxford: Henry Frowde; via EDD Online 4.0, University of Innsbruck (CC BY 4.0)