jalde

Forms

jalde (plural jaldes)^[1] Old Spanish texts also write ialde.^[2][3] The variants jaldo and jaldre have the same sense.^[4][5]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Old French jalne (“yellow”), from Latin galbĭnus (“pale green, greenish-yellow”).^[6][1][4] The Old French word is the source of French jaune, and Italian giallo and Portuguese jalne, jalde and jardo were borrowed from it as well, while Romanian galben continues the Latin word directly.^[7]

The Latin adjective meant “greenish-yellow”, and its neuter plural named greenish-yellow clothes, which were thought effeminate.^[8] Lewis and Short derive it from galbanum or from a galbus;^[9][10] Wiktionary calls it of unknown origin, perhaps from the same plant resin though the formation is unclear, and notes that it is not related to Proto-Germanic *gelwaz (“yellow”).^[9][10] In the Latin of Gaul it displaced the older words for yellow, flāvus and fulvus.^[11]

Older dictionaries explained it otherwise: Covarrubias (1611) took it for a Tuscan word that was itself from French, and the Academy's editions of 1884 and 1899 derived it from Medieval Latin jaldus and German gelb.^[12][13]

Earliest recorded meaning

The Semejanza del mundo (c. 1223) uses it of a stone, of which quanto jalde es mejor “the more yellow it is, the better”.^[14] Alfonso X's Lapidario (c. 1250) says the same of another stone, la mas ialde es la meior, and of a white stone from which comes color ialde como daçafran, a colour as yellow as saffron.^[14][3]

Semantic evolution

In the 13th and 14th centuries it was an ordinary word for a strong yellow: the General Estoria has a flower ialde como açafran and garments of jalde e de verde, and a document of 1340 lists cords dyed black, yellow, white and purple.^[14] Nebrija equates jalde with the colour of orpiment (oropimente).^[15] In 1548 Fernández de Oviedo, writing in Santo Domingo, still used it for the colours of ripening fruit.^[16]

Covarrubias defines it as a burning yellow.^[12] By the time of the Quijote, with its knight de las armas jaldes, Cejador considers it a word of heraldry, like gules for red and sable for black, and Terreros (1786–1793) gives it as the heraldic term.^[17][18][19] From 1817 the Academy defines it as a deep yellow, and the DLE still does, as an adjective and as a noun.^[20][1]

Timeline

• c. 1223 – the Semejanza del mundo has jalde;^[14][2] DEMel dates the text 1223–1300.^[14][2]
• c. 1250 – Alfonso X's Lapidario uses ialde for yellow stones.^[14]
• c. 1275 – the General Estoria has a flower ialde como açafran.^[14]
• 1288 – the date Corominas gives for the first record.^[6]
• early 15th century – the derivative jaldado.^[6]
• 1513 – Nebrija equates the colour with orpiment.^[15]
• 1548 – Fernández de Oviedo uses it in Santo Domingo.^[16]
• 1611 – Covarrubias derives it from Tuscan and French.^[12]
• 1817 – the Academy defines it as a deep yellow.^[20]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Of a colour: deep yellow; also as a noun, the colour itself: El escudo lleva un león sobre campo jalde.^[1][21]
2. Having that colour.^[1]

Word family

• jaldado

Related words

• French jaune
• Italian giallo
• Latin galbinus

Usage notes

The word is now mostly literary or heraldic;^[22][4][18] jaldado and jaldo are old words for the same colour.^[22][4][18]

References

1. ^ a b c d e 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. jalde
2. ^ a b c Diccionario del Español Medieval electrónico (DEMel), data publication 2026 (CC BY-SA), Universität Rostock, p. s.v. jalde
3. ^ 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. jalde
4. ^ a b c d García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. 3013
5. ^ Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. jalde
6. ^ a b c Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. jalde
7. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. s.v. galbinus
8. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. s.v. galbinus
9. ^ a b Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press, p. s.v. galbinus
10. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
11. ^ Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert, p. s.v. jaune
12. ^ 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. 1008
13. ^ Real Academia Española (1899), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 13th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de los Sres. Hernando y Compañía, p. 571
14. ^ a b c d e f g Real Academia Española (2013–), Corpus del Diccionario histórico de la lengua española (CDH), version 3.1, https://apps.rae.es/CNDHE, p. s.v. jalde
15. ^ a b Nebrija, Antonio de (1513), Vocabulario español-latino, Salamanca, ed. Marina Vidal Díez (2007), Biblioteca Virtual Miguel de Cervantes, p. 365
16. ^ a b 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. jalde
17. ^ 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. 640
18. ^ a b c Terreros y Pando, Esteban de (1786–1793), Diccionario castellano con las voces de ciencias y artes y sus correspondientes de las tres lenguas francesa, latina e italiana, 4 vols., Madrid: Viuda de Ibarra, p. 2, 374
19. ^ Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 4, 427
20. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1817), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 5th ed., Madrid: Imprenta Real, p. 505
21. ^ Battaner Arias, Paz (dir.) (2017), Diccionario general de la lengua española VOX, Barcelona: Larousse Editorial, p. s.v. jalde
22. ^ a b 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. jaldado