Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
registered 1908 as trademark, named for designers C.S. Rolls (1877-1910) and Sir Henry Royce (1863-1933). Figurative use from 1916 for any product deemed to be of high quality. Shortened form Rolls first attested 1928.
Wikipedia
Rolls-Royce may refer to:
- Rolls-Royce Limited, the original company founded in 1906 which split into Rolls-Royce plc and Rolls-Royce Motors in 1973
-
Rolls-Royce Holdings, an aerospace, power systems and defence company (named Rolls-Royce plc from 1973 through 2003)
- Rolls-Royce Deutschland
- Rolls-Royce Marine Power Operations
- Rolls-Royce North America
- Rolls-Royce Turbomeca Limited
- Rolls-Royce AB and Kamewa
- Rolls-Royce Motors, the motor car manufacturing entity established in the 1973 de-merger of Rolls-Royce Limited and the predecessor of Bentley Motors Limited, a subsidiary of Volkswagen Group from 1998 to 2002
- Rolls-Royce Motor Cars, an entity created in 1998 as a subsidiary of BMW Group for the manufacture of Rolls-Royce branded motor cars
Usage examples of "rolls-royce".
He put an arm round her shoulders as he smiled at Beatrice and walked to the dark grey Rolls-Royce parked to one side of the drive.
The bus was a tongue-red-and-black doubledecker manufactured by Rolls-Royce in 1953.
Chine was just gettin' out of his Rolls-Royce, and he came up and asked me what I wanted.
The motorcycle outriders were sitting astride their machines flanking the newly polished but passenger-less Rolls-Royce command car, with its gay pennants and its driver sitting lugubriously at the wheel.
They were all right for rich women with fur coats and chauffeured Rolls-Royces and penthouse apartments.
Solo il cortile ghiaiato da poco, sotto le finestre a colonnine e i frontoni a gradini, definiva l'epoca, perché lì era parcheggiato uno schieramento spettacoloso di Bentley, Rolls-Royce e Daimler.
It was a two-year-old Rolls-Royce town car camouflaged for the use of the General Staff but Anselmo did not know that.
It was not an unusual amount of cars to move upon that road but Anselmo did not distinguish between the Fords, Fiats, Opels, Renaults, and Citroens of the staff of the Division that held the passes and the line of the mountain and the Rolls-Royces, Lancias, Mercedes, and Isottas of the General Staff.
Little plastic models of the Busted Flush, accurate down to the oversize shower stall, and of Miss Agnes the electric-blue Rolls-Royce pickup truck.
Between his ribcage and his knees he was mostly plastic bags and tubes and things that are to a colostomy bag what a Rolls-Royce is to a dogcart.
He strolled off trailing douds of incense, not even bothering to look towards the Rolls-Royce.
Carrying the grotesque dummies, they filed through the piles of junk until the dark bulk of the Rolls-Royce blocked their way.
Your stratagem in sending away that highly visible Rolls-Royce with dummies inside was most amusing, but it did not work.
Having spent a lifetime working with machines, I know very well that mankind hasn't yet succeeded in building one that won't break down, whether it's an electric toothbrush or a Rolls-Royce car.
Our tropical Rolls-Royce crunched to a stop with the aid of hand brake, foot brake, and first-gear compression.