One entry found for sherry.

Main Entry: sher·ry
Pronunciation: sher-
Function: noun
Inflected Form(s): plural sherries
Etymology: named for Xeres (now spelled Jerez), a city in Spain where the wine was originally made
: a wine with a nutty flavor
Word History It is common to name wines after the part of a country where they are made. The wine with a nutty taste called sherry today was first made in a town originally called, in Spanish, Xeres. The English approximation of the Spanish pronunciation was \sher-z\, spelled sherris. After a time, people thought that sherris was a plural and so made a singular form, sherry, by cutting off the supposed plural ending. The \sh\ sound symbolized by x in Spanish (later by j) changed to a \k\ or \h\, so that the modern Spanish pronunciation of Jerez is even less like English sherry.