Etymologically
Log in

alto

History Permalink

Etymology and origin of the Spanish word alto

alto1 high, tall

Confidence
Established
Formation
Inherited
First attested
c. 1140 Cantar de mio Cid
Inherited from
Latin altus
Ultimate origin
Latin altus
Etymology tree of alto1
inherited borrowed derived
Latin altus
French haut
Italian alto
English alto
Spanish alto
From the same root · alto1
Latin altē ← altus
Latin altisonus ← altus
Latin altitūdō ← altus
Latin altum ← altus
Latin praealtus ← altus
French hauteur ← haut
Italian altezza ← alto

Pronunciation

  • /ˈalto/, [ˈal̪.t̪o][1]

Forms

alto (feminine alta, masculine plural altos, feminine plural altas, superlative altísimo)[1] The fully popular form oto appears in early place names (Ripa ota 1091), and the oldest records of the word, as alto, auto, oto and otiello, are all in place names.[2][3] Galician has alto beside the popular outo, the form Castelao uses;[3][4] Asturian has altu.[3][4]

Etymology

The word for “high, tall” is inherited from Latin altus (“high; deep”).[3][5][6] Corominas explains its sound as the influence of the more learned layers of speech: a fully popular word would have become oto, the form of place names such as ⟨Ribota⟩, ⟨Montoto⟩ and ⟨Grijota⟩, which was still understood as “high” in the 11th and 12th centuries.[3][1] Wiktionary therefore calls it a learned borrowing, while Vox calls it a popular word, and Prat Sabater notes that the DCECH treats it as inherited although its /l/ did not vocalise.[1][7][8] The popular form survives in otear and otero.[1][7]

The same Latin word is Portuguese alto, Galician outo, Asturian altu, Catalan alt, Italian alto and French haut, whose ⟨h⟩ comes from a cross with Frankish *hauh (“high”).[9][10][11] Portuguese outeiro (“hillock”) is from a derivative Vulgar Latin *altarius.[12]

The Latin word has the form of the past participle of alō (“to nourish”), as if “grown”; de Vaan finds the meanings hard to reconcile.[13][14][15] It goes back to Proto-Italic *altos and Proto-Indo-European *h₂eltós, from *h₂el- (“to grow, nourish”), the source also of Proto-Germanic *aldaz (“old”).[1][15]

Earliest recorded meaning

The DCECH and the BDELC date the word to 1042, a record in Menéndez Pidal's Orígenes, which the TDHLE lists as the place name Pietra alta in a charter of Leyre in Navarre.[3][5][2] In running text the Cantar de mio Cid (c. 1140, in a 14th-century copy) has it of the voice: Los de mio Cid a altas vozes llaman “the Cid's men call out loudly”, and of towers, las otras torres altas.[16][17][18]

Semantic evolution

Old Spanish used the word for what is raised up, for loud sound (a altas vozes), for high rank (altos sennores in Alfonso X's Lapidario) and for the open sea (alta mar).[18][19] As a noun it named the sky and, in the plural, people of high condition.[18] Covarrubias in 1611 adds the figurative “hidden, profound” (alto misterio) and the phrase passarse por alto, taken from the ball game, when the ball goes over the head of the player waiting for it.[20]

The Diccionario de Autoridades gives the senses “raised above the ground”, “tall” of persons, and “hard to understand”.[21] Baralt condemned altas horas de la noche as a gallicism, but Corominas shows that French has no such phrase.[3] The noun names a hill or rise in place names everywhere, and in Argentina a small rise and a heap.[3] In Chile, Peru and the Río de la Plata un alto is a pile of things; in Cuba, Puerto Rico, Venezuela and elsewhere los altos is the upper floor of a house; in Colombia and Ecuador a garment is alto when it is short.[22][23][24] In the Canaries el alto is the deep fishing ground beyond the island shelf.[25][2]

Timeline

  • 867 – Ripa auta in the cartulary of San Millán, one of the place names that are the oldest traces of the word.[2]
  • 1042 – Pietra alta, a place name in a charter of Leyre, the date the DCECH and the BDELC give.[2][3][5]
  • 1091 – the popular form in the place name Ripa ota, at Sahagún.[2][3]
  • c. 1140 – the Cantar de mio Cid uses alto of voices and towers.[16][17]
  • 1219 – the derivative altura is first recorded.[5]
  • 1250–1279 – Alfonso X's Lapidario calls a mountain grand & muy alto.[19]
  • c. 1495 – Nebrija renders it with Latin altus, celsus, excelsus, sublimis and summus.[26]
  • 1516 – the first record from the Americas, in Puerto Rico.[27]
  • 1611 – Covarrubias records passarse por alto.[20]
  • 1884 – the Academy's dictionary gives the etymology Del lat. altus.[28]

Meanings

Adjective

  1. high, raised above the ground: una torre alta.[6][1]
  2. Of a person: tall.[6][1]
  3. Higher than another thing it is compared with; of a town, region or street, lying higher than another: la parte alta del pueblo.[6]
  4. At a great altitude; of a river, near its source: el alto Tajo.[6]
  5. Of a river: in flood; of the sea: rough.[6]
  6. Of a historical period: in its early stages, as in la Alta Edad Media.[6]
  7. Of a person, post or thing: of high rank, noble, senior, as in alto cargo and alta traición.[6][1]
  8. Of a sound: loud, as in en voz alta; also high-pitched.[6][1]
  9. Of a period of time: late, as in a altas horas de la noche.[6]
  10. Of a female animal: in heat.[6]
  11. (physics) Of temperature, pressure, frequency and the like: higher than usual, as in alta tensión.[6]

Noun

  1. Height: La caja tiene un metro de alto.[6][1]
  2. A hill or rise in the country.[6]
  3. An upper floor of a building; in the plural, the upper floors as against the ground floor.[6]
  4. (Argentina, Chile, Peru, Uruguay) A heap, a large quantity of things.[6][22]

Adverb

  1. High up: Las golondrinas vuelan alto.[6][1]
  2. Loudly; with high volume: Habla más alto.[6][1]

Word family

  • altura
  • alteza
  • altivo
  • altanero
  • altillo
  • enaltecer
  • altamente
  • altibajo
  • altiplanicie
  • altisonante
  • altavoz
  • peraltar
  • contralto

alto2 halt, stop

Confidence
Established
Formation
Borrowing
First attested
1571 Diego Hurtado de Mendoza
Borrowed from
German halt
Ultimate origin
German halten

Pronunciation

  • /ˈalto/, [ˈal̪.t̪o][1]

Forms

alto m (plural altos)[1]

Etymology

The word for “halt” is borrowed from German halt (“stop”), a military word derived from halten (“to hold, stop”).[29][30][6] French halte and Italian alto appear at about the same time, so Corominas thinks the three languages took the word independently during the wars of the Reformation.[29] Bénaben describes the German word as the imperative of the verb turned into a noun.[31] Cejador derived it instead through the French word, mixed with the adjective alto1.[32]

Earliest recorded meaning

Corominas's first record is the history of Diego Hurtado de Mendoza, written about 1571–75.[29][30] Cuervo quotes him for the phrase hacer alto, of troops halting: La vanguardia caminaba cuanto podia, sin hacer alto “the vanguard marched as fast as it could, without halting”.[33]

Semantic evolution

Covarrubias in 1611 calls hazer alto a camp term, and explains it, by his own etymology, from the staff of the standard being raised and fixed in the ground.[20] Juan Hidalgo's thieves' vocabulary of 1609 has alto: pararse.[29][34] The Academy's 1869 dictionary still listed the halt of marching troops as a sense of the adjective's entry; the DLE now gives it a separate entry.[35][6] From the army the word spread to any pause in an activity, and in Central America, Colombia, Mexico and Peru it names the stop sign of road traffic.[6][22]

Timeline

  • 1571 – the first record, in the BDELC; the DCECH dates it 1571–75, in Hurtado de Mendoza.[30][29]
  • 1609 – Hidalgo's vocabulary of germanía has alto “to stop”.[34]
  • 1611 – Covarrubias records hazer alto as a military term.[20]
  • 1869 – the Academy's dictionary defines it as the halt of troops on the march.[35]

Meanings

Noun

  1. A halt or stop in a march or in any other activity: hicimos un alto para comer.[6][1]
  2. (Central America, Colombia, Mexico, Peru) A stop sign.[6][22]

Interjection

  1. Halt!, stop!: used to order someone to stop or to stop doing something.[6][1]

Word family

  • alto el fuego
  • altitud
  • otear
  • otero
  • exaltar
  • Latin altus
  • French haut

Usage notes

Besides the two words, Corominas finds the interjection ¡alto! “come on!” of doubtful origin: Cuervo took it from the military ¡alto!, but it may be the adjective used like ¡sus! and ¡arriba!, as in Ercilla's Alto, sus, que yo acepto el desafío of 1569, one of the earliest examples.[3] The DLE also lists, under the adjective, a rarely used noun alto for the viola.[6] Before the stressed vowel Mexican popular speech elides the article: l'alto.[36]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f Real Academia Española (2021–), Tesoro de los diccionarios históricos de la lengua española (TDHLE): Diccionario histórico (1933–1936), its unpublished slips, Diccionario histórico (1960–1996), DHECan, DHECR, DHEVen, https://www.rae.es/tdhle, p. s.v. alto
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 1, 220
  4. ^ a b Academia de la Llingua Asturiana (2000), Diccionariu de la Llingua Asturiana, Uviéu: ALLA; online at https://mas.academiadelallingua.com/diccionariu, p. s.v. altu
  5. ^ a b c d Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. alto I
  6. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y Real Academia Española; Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española (2014–), Diccionario de la lengua española, 23rd ed., online version 23.8, https://dle.rae.es, p. s.v. alto
  7. ^ a b Battaner Arias, Paz (dir.) (2017), Diccionario general de la lengua española VOX, Barcelona: Larousse Editorial, p. s.v. alto
  8. ^ Prat Sabater, Marta (2003), Préstamos del catalán en el léxico español, doctoral thesis, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, p. 99
  9. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. s.v. altus
  10. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 387
  11. ^ Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
  12. ^ Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. 2425
  13. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  14. ^ Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  15. ^ a b de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
  16. ^ a b Real Academia Española (2013–), Corpus del Diccionario histórico de la lengua española (CDH), version 3.1, https://apps.rae.es/CNDHE, p. s.v. alto
  17. ^ a b Alonso Pedraz, Martín (1986), Diccionario medieval español: desde las Glosas Emilianenses y Silenses (s. X) hasta el siglo XV, 2 vols., Salamanca: Universidad Pontificia de Salamanca, p. 267
  18. ^ a b c Boggs, R. S.; Kasten, Lloyd; Keniston, Hayward; Richardson, H. B. (1946), Tentative Dictionary of Medieval Spanish, 2 vols., Chapel Hill, N.C., p. 30
  19. ^ a b Kasten, Lloyd A.; Nitti, John J.; Gago Jover, Francisco (2002–), Diccionario de la prosa castellana del Rey Alfonso X, New York: Hispanic Seminary of Medieval Studies (electronic edition 2024), p. s.v. alto
  20. ^ a b c d Covarrubias Orozco, Sebastián de (1611), Tesoro de la lengua castellana o española, Madrid: Luis Sánchez (Biblioteca Wordkers transcription, CC BY 4.0), p. 157
  21. ^ Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. s.v. alto
  22. ^ a b c d Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española (2010), Diccionario de americanismos, Lima: Santillana; online at https://www.asale.org/damer, p. s.v. alto
  23. ^ Román, Manuel Antonio (1901–1918), Diccionario de chilenismos y de otras voces y locuciones viciosas, 5 vols., Santiago de Chile: Imprenta de San José, p. 46
  24. ^ Malaret, Augusto (1999), Vocabulario de Puerto Rico, critical ed. by Humberto López Morales, Madrid: Arco/Libros (1st ed. 1937), p. 89
  25. ^ Academia Canaria de la Lengua (2010), Diccionario básico de canarismos, Santa Cruz de Tenerife; online at https://www.academiacanarialengua.org, p. s.v. alto
  26. ^ Nebrija, Antonio de (1513), Vocabulario español-latino, Salamanca, ed. Marina Vidal Díez (2007), Biblioteca Virtual Miguel de Cervantes, p. 291
  27. ^ Boyd-Bowman, Peter (2003), Léxico hispanoamericano 1493–1993, ed. Ray Harris-Northall and John J. Nitti, New York: Hispanic Seminary of Medieval Studies, p. s.v. alto
  28. ^ Real Academia Española (1884), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 12th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Gregorio Hernando (the first Academy edition with etymologies), p. 61
  29. ^ a b c d e Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 1, 222
  30. ^ a b c Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. alto II
  31. ^ Bénaben, Michel (2000), Dictionnaire étymologique de l'espagnol, Paris: Ellipses, p. s.v. alto
  32. ^ Cejador y Frauca, Julio (1905–1906), La lengua de Cervantes: gramática y diccionario de la lengua castellana en El ingenioso hidalgo don Quijote de la Mancha, 2 vols., Madrid: Jaime Ratés, p. 78
  33. ^ Cuervo, Rufino José (1886–1893), Diccionario de construcción y régimen de la lengua castellana, vols. I–II (A–D), París: A. Roger y F. Chernoviz, p. 1, 366
  34. ^ a b Hidalgo, Juan (1609), Romances de germanía de varios autores, con el vocabulario por la orden del a.b.c. para declaración de sus términos y lengua, Barcelona: Sebastián de Cormellas (ed. Madrid 1779), p. 158
  35. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1869), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 11th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de Don Manuel Rivadeneyra, p. 42
  36. ^ Henríquez Ureña, Pedro (2015), Obras completas, vol. 12: 1936–1940 III, ed. Miguel D. Mena, Santo Domingo: Ministerio de Cultura, p. 56

Related etymologies

Cite this entry

“Alto.” Etymologically, 7 Nov. 2026, etymologically.com/es/alto. Accessed 7 Nov. 2026.

Last edited on . ·