Word.ws English Dictionary

negress

/ˈniːɡɹɪs/

negress noun: a black female.

Noun (1)

negress (plural negresses)

  1. (dated, literary, now offensive and an ethnic slur) A black female.
    • Directly they were trotted off in their little pea-green and gilt carriage, guardian negress and all, I went into the shop, about which I had all this time been loafingly prowling, and called, clapping my hands, for some violet sherbet, […]1860, Walter Thornbury, Turkish Life and Character, volume 1, page 137
    • Hardly anywhere in the world will you find a negress driving a car. A negress acting as a chauffeur is still more extraordinary. Barely conceivable even in Harlem, but that was certainly where the car was from.1954, Ian Fleming, Live and Let Die, London: Pan Books, published 1957, page 6

Noun (2) capitalized: Negress

Negress (plural Negresses)

  1. Alternative letter-case form of negress.

negress meaning in Arabic and Persian

negress in Arabic

black female
زِنْجِيَّة zinjiyya, زَنْجِيَّة zanjiyya, سَوْدَاء sawdāʔ

negress in Persian

black female
ددهسیاه dade-siyâh

Synonyms of negress

2 more synonymsFewer synonyms
  • person of color
  • colored person

All synonyms of negress

Forms of negress

pluralnegresses
alternative formNegress
pluralNegresses

Origin of negress

From French négresse, from nègre. Equivalent to Negro + -ess.

From French négresse, feminine of nègre, equivalent to Negro + -ess.

Questions about negress

What does negress mean?
Negress means a black female.
What is negress in Arabic?
Negress in Arabic is زِنْجِيَّة (zinjiyya), زَنْجِيَّة (zanjiyya), سَوْدَاء (sawdāʔ). See Negress meaning in Arabic.
What part of speech is negress?
Negress is a noun.
How do you pronounce negress?
Negress is pronounced /ˈniːɡɹɪs/.
What is the plural of negress?
The plural of negress is negresses.

Words near negress in the dictionary

  1. Negrași
  2. Negreira
  3. Negrense
  4. Negrenses
  5. Negrescu
  6. negress
  7. negresses
  8. Negrete
  9. Negretes
  10. negrette
  11. negrettes

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: negress (page history and authors); Negress (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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