gallery

Pronunciation

• IPA: /ˈɡæl.ər.i/^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English gallerie, borrowed from Middle French galerie (“a long portico”),^[2][3][4] from Italian galleria “gallery, church porch”^[5][6] and Medieval Latin galeria, of uncertain origin.^[2][3] It is perhaps an alteration of Medieval Latin galilea “church porch”, from Latin Galilaea, the region of Galilee in Palestine,^[2][3][4] perhaps because the porch was at the far end of the church from the altar, as Galilee was an outlying region.^[7][3] It is related to galilee.^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

A covered walk or passage, partly open at the side: before 1439 in Barnhart, in Lydgate's Fall of Princes, the mid-15th century in Etymonline and before 1500 in the OED.^[3][2][8]

Semantic evolution

A long platform or balcony outside a building is from 1509,^[8] a raised floor inside a church from 1630,^[8] and in a theatre from 1690.^[8] A building or room for works of art is from 1591, in Shakespeare's 1 Henry VI.^[3][2] The people in the cheapest theatre seats were the gallery by Lovelace's poems (1649),^[3][2] hence to play to the gallery (1867).^[2] In mining and military use it is an underground passage.^[8][9] In parts of the American South a gallery is a roofed porch along the side of a house.^[9]

Timeline

• c. 1439 – a covered walk.^[3]
• 1509 – an outside balcony.^[8]
• 1591 – a place to show works of art.^[3]
• 1630 – a church gallery.^[8]
• 1649 – theatre-goers in the cheap seats.^[3]
• 1867 – play to the gallery.^[2]

Modern meaning

Noun

1. A room or building where works of art are shown or sold.
2. A raised floor projecting from the inside wall of a church, hall or theatre.
3. The highest and cheapest seats in a theatre, or the people in them.
4. A long room or passage; a covered walk.
5. An underground passage in a mine or fort.
6. (US, Southern) A porch along the side of a house.

Word family

• galleried
• galleryite
• gallerylike
• gallerygoer
• gallery forest
• peanut gallery
• press gallery
• rogues' gallery

Related words

• galilee

References

1. ^ Jones, Daniel (2011), Cambridge English Pronouncing Dictionary, 18th ed., ed. Peter Roach, Jane Setter and John Esling, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
2. ^ a b c d e f g h Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
4. ^ a b c Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
5. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ Pearsall, Judy, ed. (1998), The New Oxford Dictionary of English, Oxford: Clarendon Press
7. ^ Cresswell, Julia (2021), Oxford Dictionary of Word Origins, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ a b c d e f g Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
9. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (1992), 3rd ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin