rex

From Latin rēx (“king”), referring originally to rabbits of the Belgian "castorrex" breed, so named because their fur was similar to that of beavers. Entered English around 1920. Doublet of rajah and roy.

rex (plural rexes or (rare, sense 1 only) reges)

1. A king, particularly in ancient Rome.
   • 1902, Frederick Engels, translated by Ernest Untermann, “Gens and State in Rome”, in The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State, Chicago, Ill.: Charles H[ope] Kerr & Company, →OCLC, page 155:

     And though the sturdy patrician nobility had already gained ground, though the reges attempted gradually to enlarge the scope of their functions—all this does not change the elementary and fundamental character of the constitution, and this alone is essential.

2. An animal which has a genetic recessive variation that causes the guard hairs to be very short or fully lacking.

rex (third-person singular simple present rexes, present participle rexing, simple past and past participle rexed)

1. (transitive) To breed (an animal) to have this kind of hair.

• Ex'r, Xer, xer-

• ℞

From Proto-Italic *rēks, from Proto-Indo-European *h₃rḗǵs (“king, ruler”). Cognates include Sanskrit राजन् (rā́jan, “king”) and Old Irish rí (“king”).

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): [ˈreːks]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): [ˈrɛks]

rēx m (genitive rēgis, feminine rēgīna); third declension

1. king, ruler
   • 29 BCE – 19 BCE, Virgil, Aeneid 1.544–545:

     “Rēx erat Aenēās nōbīs quō iūstior alter
     nec pietāte fuit nec bellō maior et armīs.”

     “We had a king, Aeneas: [None] other than he was more just, nor dutiful, nor [skillful] in war and with weaponry.”

   • Late 4th century, Jerome [et al.], transl., edited by Roger Gryson, Biblia Sacra: Iuxta Vulgatam Versionem (Vulgate), 5th edition, Stuttgart: Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, published 2007, →ISBN, Danihelis 1:1:

     annō tertiō rēgnī Ioachim rēgis Iuda vēnit Nabuchodonosor rēx Babylōnis Hierūsalēm et obsēdit eam

     "In the third year of the reign of Jehoiakim king of Judah came Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon unto Jerusalem, and besieged it."

2. (derogatory) despot, tyrant (during the time of the Republic when there were no kings and executive power was usually divided)
3. (Late Latin, chess) king

Third-declension noun.

• Rēcei is an early form of rēgī.

Borrowings:

• “rex”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “rex”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• "rex", in Charles du Fresne du Cange’s Glossarium Mediæ et Infimæ Latinitatis (augmented edition with additions by D. P. Carpenterius, Adelungius and others, edited by Léopold Favre, 1883–1887)
• rex in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.
• Carl Meißner, Henry William Auden (1894) Latin Phrase-Book‎^[1], London: Macmillan and Co.
  • to establish some one as king, tyrant: aliquem regem, tyrannum constituere
    
  • to restore a king to his throne (not in solium): regem restituere
    
  • (ambiguous) to belong to the king's bodyguard: a latere regis esse
    
• “rex”, in Harry Thurston Peck, editor (1898), Harper’s Dictionary of Classical Antiquities, New York: Harper & Brothers
• “rex”, in William Smith et al., editor (1890), A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities, London: William Wayte. G. E. Marindin

From Latin rēx.

• (Old Lombard) IPA^(key): [ˈɾɛʒ]

rex m (feminine regina)

1. (Old Lombard) king

(This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.)

rex ?

1. side