 The genus name "Nebrius" is derived from the Greek word "nebris" or "nebridos", meaning the skin of a fawn.The specific epithet "ferrugineus" is Latin for "rust-colored".Other common names for this species include giant sleepy shark, Madame X (a name coined by the shark fisherman Norman Caldwell in the 1930s for the then-unidentified Australian specimens), nurse shark, rusty catshark, rusty shark, sleepy shark, spitting shark, and tawny shark.