type of Afro-Cuban dance, also a ballroom dance based on it, the rhythm of it, and the music suitable for it; 1914 ("La Rumba" was the name of a popular tango melody from 1913), from Cuban Spanish rumba, originally "spree, carousal," derived from Spanish rumbo "spree, party," earlier "ostentation, pomp, leadership," perhaps originally "the course of a ship," from rombo "rhombus," in reference to the compass, which is marked with a rhombus. The verb is recorded from 1932. Related: Rumbaed; rumbaing.
South Korean capital, from Korean soul, literally "capital." It was the national capital from 1392 until Japanese annexation in 1910.
Chinese capital, from bei "north" + jing "capital" (as opposed to Nanking, literally "southern capital").
nickname of Argentine Marxist revolutionary Ernesto Guevara (1928-1967), given to him by Cuban exiles in Guatemala in mid-1950s, from his dialectal use of Argentine che, a slang filler word in speech.
city in China, literally "southern capital," from Chinese nan "south" + jing "capital."
capital of Australia, 1826, from Aborigine nganbirra "meeting place."
1550s, "the grain of Indian corn;" 1580s of the cereal plant of the grass family that produces it, from Cuban Spanish maiz, from Arawakan (Haiti) mahiz, the native name of the plant. In Europe it was formerly also called Turkey corn; like the fowl, this is from mistaken notions of its origin.
1860, "act of converting (assets) to capital," noun of action from capitalize in the financial sense. The meaning "act of writing or printing in capital letters" is recorded from 1847, from the writing sense.
