his nibs
noun phrase

- an informal and gently mocking title for a person in authority, especially one who takes their own importance very seriously; used in place of a formal title such as "His Lordship" or "His Excellency" — but with a knowing wink.

- a humorous or lightly derisive way to refer to a demanding boss, a self-important manager, or anyone who behaves as though they outrank the rest of the room; the equivalent form for a woman is her nibs.

Collins English Dictionary; Merriam-Webster Dictionary

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WORD ORIGIN

Nobody rises to the top of British slang without a colourful past, and his nibs is no exception. The phrase first appeared in print around 1820, though it was almost certainly in spoken circulation well before that. Its earliest printed definition — appearing in a glossary of the time — offers the gloriously unhelpful explanation that it means simply "the person referred to."

The specific flavour of pomposity came later, once speakers discovered that mock-aristocratic titles were the perfect vehicle for gentle mockery.

The word nibs itself is a close relative of nabs, recorded even earlier in the 1790s, which in turn traces back to nab — an old term for the head. The same root family includes nob or knob (head, and by extension a person of standing), and neb, the Old English word for beak or snout, which also gave us the nib of a pen. So at its core, his nibs is a roundabout way of saying "the head man".

What makes the phrase so enduringly useful is its tone: it is not quite rude and not quite respectful, hovering in that productive no-man's-land of the rolling eye. British office culture has always needed a word for the person who sweeps in fifteen minutes late to their own meeting, his nibs fills that gap perfectly.

Helga & Paul Smith

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SYNONYMS

big cheese, big enchilada, big kahuna, big noise, big shot, big wig, boss, brass, chief, grandee, HIS NIBS, high-up, hotshot, kingpin, lord and master, macher, mover and shaker, numero uno, overlord, pooh-bah, potentate, the man himself, the one in charge, the top banana, the top brass, top dog

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SMUGGLE OWAD into a conversation today, say something like:

"We'd better tidy the conference room — HIS NIBS will be joining in person."

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