peloso

Forms

peloso (feminine pelosa, masculine plural pelosos, feminine plural pelosas)^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin pilōsus (“hairy, shaggy”), a derivative of pilus (“hair”).^[2][1][3][4] Corominas lists it among the derivatives of pelo in Spanish, and García de Diego places it under the Latin adjective, beside the learned piloso, which keeps the Latin vowel.^[5][6][7]

The same Latin adjective is Portuguese peloso, Catalan pelós, Italian peloso and Romanian păros, and with another sense French pelouse “lawn”.^[8][9][1] French also borrowed it in learned form as pileux.^[10]

De Vaan gives no further etymology for the Latin noun.^[4] Older works traced it to a Proto-Indo-European word for hair or felt, shared with Ancient Greek πῖλος (pîlos, “felt”), a view Wiktionary says is no longer accepted.^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

The Old Spanish Textual Archive first finds the word in versions of the Fuero general de Navarra in 14th-century manuscripts.^[11] The DEMel's earliest dated records are from a Bible translation of about 1400, with the forms peloso and pelosas.^[12] Corominas's Breve diccionario dates it 1438, Segura Munguía 1434, and the full DCECH cites Alfonso de Palencia (1490).^[6][9][5] In all of them it means “having hair, hairy”.^[5][9]

Semantic evolution

Nebrija rendered it with Latin pilosus and villosus.^[13] A text of 1548 from Santo Domingo uses it of a leaf “somewhat hairy”, and a Mexican text of 1576 of a long hairy tail.^[14] The Diccionario de Autoridades defined it as “that which has hair” and added a slang sense of the feminine noun pelosa, a skirt, cloak or blanket in the thieves' cant (germanía) recorded by Juan Hidalgo.^[15] Terreros gave peloso as a cape of coarse wool among the same people.^[16] The Academy dropped the slang sense after 1869 and has since defined the adjective only as “having hair”.^[17][18][2] In Asturian pelosu also names a poor variety of chestnut and a spider crab.^[19][5]

Timeline

• 1301–1400 – the Fuero general de Navarra has the word, in manuscripts of the 14th century.^[11]
• c. 1400 – peloso and pelosas in a Bible translation.^[12]
• 1438 – Corominas's date for the word.^[6]
• 1490 – Alfonso de Palencia uses it.^[5]
• 1513 – Nebrija gives Latin pilosus as its equivalent.^[13]
• 1548 – first record in the Americas, in Santo Domingo.^[14]
• 1737 – the Diccionario de Autoridades records it, with the germanía noun pelosa.^[15]
• 1884 – the Academy gives its etymology from Latin pilosus.^[18]

Meanings

Adjective

1. hairy, having hair: Tenía unos brazos pelosos y morenos.^[2][20][1]

Related words

• pelo
• piloso
• peludo
• Latin pilōsus
• Portuguese peloso

Usage notes

Peloso is much less common than the synonym peludo, which Terreros already gave beside it.^[16] In old thieves' slang the feminine pelosa was a noun for a skirt, cloak or blanket.^[15][17]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c 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. peloso
3. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
4. ^ 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
5. ^ a b c d e Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 4, 465
6. ^ a b c Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. pelo
7. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. art. 5030
8. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. s.v. pilōsus
9. ^ a b c Segura Munguía, Santiago (2014), Lexicón etimológico y semántico del latín y de las voces actuales que proceden de raíces latinas o griegas, Bilbao: Universidad de Deusto, p. 576
10. ^ Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert, p. s.v. pileux
11. ^ a b Hispanic Seminary of Medieval Studies (2026), Old Spanish Textual Archive (OSTA): semi-paleographic transcriptions of Old Spanish texts, ed. Francisco Gago Jover et al., https://www.hispanicseminary.org
12. ^ a b Diccionario del Español Medieval electrónico (DEMel), data publication 2026 (CC BY-SA), Universität Rostock, p. s.v. peloso
13. ^ a b Nebrija, Antonio de (1513), Vocabulario español-latino, Salamanca, ed. Marina Vidal Díez (2007), Biblioteca Virtual Miguel de Cervantes, p. 395
14. ^ 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. peloso
15. ^ a b c Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 5, 197
16. ^ a b 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. 3, 83
17. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1869), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 11th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de Don Manuel Rivadeneyra, p. 589
18. ^ 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. 809
19. ^ Academia de la Llingua Asturiana (2000), Diccionariu de la Llingua Asturiana, Uviéu: ALLA; online at https://mas.academiadelallingua.com/diccionariu, p. s.v. pelosu
20. ^ Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. peloso