color

Forms

color m or f same meaning (plural colores)^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old Spanish color, inherited from Latin color (“colour”).^[2][3][4][1]

The same Latin word is Portuguese cor (older coor), Galician cor, Asturian color, Catalan color, Occitan color, French couleur, Italian colore and Romanian culoare.^[5][6][1] From French to Portuguese the word became feminine, while modern Spanish went back to the masculine.^[6][2]

Old Latin had the nominative colōs.^[7] The classical form was remade after the oblique cases, where the /s/ between vowels had turned into /r/.^[1] De Vaan traces it to Proto-Italic *kelōs (“outside, aspect”) and Proto-Indo-European *ḱel-ōs (“cover, covering”), built on the root *ḱel- (“to cover, hide”); the meaning shifted from “covering” to “colour”.^[7][1] Related Latin words are cēlāre (“to hide”), cella and occulere.^[7] The French etymological tradition explains colour as what covers and hides the surface of a thing, which also accounts for the sense “pretext”.^[8][9]

Earliest recorded meaning

In the Cantar de mio Cid (c. 1140, in a 14th-century copy), in a passage on fine cloaks and furs: „Chicos e grandes vestidos son de colores” “young and old are dressed in colours”; the poem also has sin color “pale-faced”.^[10][11] Menéndez Pidal notes that its gender there is undecided.^[11]

Semantic evolution

Until the classical period the gender wavered: the feminine was usual in the Middle Ages, especially for the colour of the face (la color), and is found in the Quijote and in Lope, though Juan Ruiz already has the masculine.^[2] Old Spanish also used it for the complexion, buena color being a healthy look, for a kind or sort, and for the peculiar character of a thing.^[12][13]

Covarrubias in 1611 calls colour the proper object of sight, with black and white as its extremes; used absolutely, color was the red rouge women put on their cheeks and lips, and it could also mean a reason or pretext, as in so color de santidad “under the colour of holiness”.^[14] The Diccionario de Autoridades says the masculine is more correct, though some use the feminine, and records rouge, the painter's colours and the sense “pretext”.^[15] The Academy gave a physical definition, the impression the light reflected from a body makes on the retina, and the etymology from Latin, in 1884.^[16] Alemany in 1917 records the five heraldic colours and a feminine la color of Chile, melted fat used to season dishes.^[17]

Modern senses include a shade of political opinion, a flush in poker and the colours of a sports club.^[4] In the Americas de color is a euphemism for a Black or mixed-race person.^[18] Color is also the red achiote paste in Colombia and Venezuela, and a coloured pencil in Colombia, Nicaragua and Cuba.^[19]

Timeline

• c. 1140 – the Cantar de mio Cid: vestidos son de colores.^[10][3]
• c. 1215 – the Vida de Santa María Egipcíaca uses the feminine la color for the complexion.^[10]
• c. 1223 – the Semejanza del mundo, the first record in a manuscript of its own time.^[10]
• 1220–1250 – colorado “adorned, fine” first recorded.^[3]
• 1330 – colorar first recorded.^[3]
• c. 1495 – Nebrija gives Latin color, colos and chroma.^[20]
• 1519 – the first record from the Americas, in Santo Domingo, in the sense “pretext”.^[21]
• 1611 – Covarrubias records color “rouge” and “pretext”.^[14]
• 1843 – colorete first recorded.^[3]
• 1884 – the Academy gives the physical definition and the etymology.^[16]

Meanings

Noun

1. colour, hue: the sensation produced by light striking the eye, which depends on its wavelength; masculine, also feminine.^[4][1]
2. The natural colour of the skin; complexion: Perdió el color del susto.^[4][1]
3. A substance for painting or dyeing.^[4]
4. Colouring, the colours of something; colorido.^[4]
5. The special character of something; the distinctive quality of a style: una novela de color sombrío.^[4][1]
6. A shade of opinion or political faction: partidos de todos los colores.^[4][1]
7. (poker) A flush.^[4][1]
8. (physics) The property of transmitted, reflected or emitted light that depends on its wavelength.^[4]
9. (heraldry) Each of the five heraldic colours.^[4][17]
10. (rare) A pretext, an apparent reason: so color de.^[4][1]
11. (in the plural) The colours of a sports club, and the club itself.^[4]
12. (Chile, Argentina; feminine) Fat or oil coloured with paprika, used for seasoning.^[19][17]

Word family

• colorar
• colorete
• colorido
• colorismo
• descolorar
• incoloro
• coloración
• colorado
• colorante
• colorear
• colorín
• colorir

Related words

• corladura
• corlar
• Latin color
• Portuguese cor
• French couleur

Usage notes

Color is masculine in standard Spanish, but the feminine survives in rural and poetic use.^[2][4] Portuguese and Galician cor are feminine.^[2] The set phrase so color de means “under the pretext of”.^[14][1]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 2, 144
3. ^ a b c d e Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. color
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n 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. color
5. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. 1734
6. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. s.v. color
7. ^ a b c de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
8. ^ Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert, p. s.v. couleur
9. ^ Bénaben, Michel (2000), Dictionnaire étymologique de l'espagnol, Paris: Ellipses, p. s.v. color
10. ^ a b c d Real Academia Española (2013–), Corpus del Diccionario histórico de la lengua española (CDH), version 3.1, https://apps.rae.es/CNDHE, p. s.v. color
11. ^ a b Menéndez Pidal, Ramón (1908–1911), Cantar de Mio Cid: texto, gramática y vocabulario, 3 vols., Madrid: Bailly-Baillière, p. 172
12. ^ 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. color
13. ^ Lanchetas, Rufino (1900), Gramática y vocabulario de las obras de Gonzalo de Berceo, Madrid: Sucesores de Rivadeneyra, p. 239
14. ^ a b c Covarrubias Orozco, Sebastián de (1611), Tesoro de la lengua castellana o española, Madrid: Luis Sánchez (Biblioteca Wordkers transcription, CC BY 4.0), p. 486
15. ^ Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 2, 420
16. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1884), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 12th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Gregorio Hernando (the first Academy edition with etymologies), p. 259
17. ^ a b c Alemany y Bolufer, José (1917), Diccionario de la lengua española, Barcelona: Ramón Sopena, p. 412
18. ^ Malaret, Augusto (1946), Diccionario de americanismos, 3rd ed., Buenos Aires: Emecé, p. 248
19. ^ a b Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española (2010), Diccionario de americanismos, Lima: Santillana; online at https://www.asale.org/damer, p. s.v. color
20. ^ Nebrija, Antonio de (1513), Vocabulario español-latino, Salamanca, ed. Marina Vidal Díez (2007), Biblioteca Virtual Miguel de Cervantes, p. 315
21. ^ 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. color