ralo

Forms

ralo (feminine rala, masculine plural ralos, feminine plural ralas)^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old Spanish ralo, inherited from Latin rārus (“loose-textured, sparse; rare”).^[2][1][3][4] Corominas calls it an old dissimilated variant of popular, inherited character: the second /r/ of the Latin word became /l/.^[5][6] Its doublet is the learned raro, which the BDELC dates to 1495; the meanings of ralo and raro have been kept apart only since the Golden Age.^[3][5][1]

The Academy's dictionaries of 1884 and 1899 derived the word instead from Latin rāllus (“thin, fine”);^[7][8][9] Alemany's dictionary of 1917 returned to the etymon given above.^[7][8][9]

The same Latin adjective is Asturian ralu, Italian rado, Old French rer and Romanian rar.^[10][11] Portuguese has the same dissimilated form, ralo, spelt rralo in the 15th century.^[12]

The origin of the Latin adjective is uncertain: it has been compared with Ancient Greek ἐρῆμος (erêmos, “lonely”) and with Lithuanian i̇̀rti (“to dissolve, fall into ruin”), but de Vaan, following Schrijver, finds none of the proposals convincing.^[13][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is in the Moamín, a book of hunting birds in a manuscript of 1250: if a falcon's feathers fail to grow o les nacieren ralas “or grow in sparse”, they are to be anointed with bear's fat.^[14][15] The Bocados de oro (c. 1250) and Alfonso X's Partidas follow.^[16] The derived verb ralear is already in the Libro de Alexandre.^[5][3]

Semantic evolution

Old Spanish used ralo both for “sparse, thin” and for “rare, seldom”; it is the usual form in Juan Ruiz and still in Alfonso de Palencia in 1490.^[5] Nebrija treats ralo as the basic form but already accepts raro beside it, in rala cosa o rara and ralas o raras vezes.^[5] In the Quijote ralo appears only once, of teeth, while raro is used for “unusual, strange”;^[5][17][18] Autoridades keeps the same division, and the Academy marked the sense “rare” as obsolete in 1817.^[5][17][18]

In the Americas the word is recorded from 1532, in Mexico, and in 1574 the physician Monardes writes of a lienço ralo, a thin cloth.^[19][20] In Mexico some speakers use ralo for “rare”, which Henríquez Ureña explains either as a widening of the sense or as a new dissimilation of raro.^[21] Across Central America, Puerto Rico, Peru and Bolivia coffee or an infusion that is too watery is ralo.^[22][23] In Cuba the noun names a field of sugar cane with many gaps.^[24][5] In the Canaries the word means “runny, not thick”, and una rala is a thin mixture of gofio with water, milk or broth.^[25] Judeo-Spanish keeps ralo “rare, sparse”.^[26]

Timeline

• 1250 – ralas in the Moamín, of a falcon's feathers.^[14][15]
• 1335 – ralo in Juan Ruiz, the BDELC's first date.^[3][5]
• c. 1495 – Nebrija gives ralo as the main form and raro as a variant.^[5]
• 1532 – first record in the Americas, in Mexico.^[19]
• 1591 – Percyvall translates it “thinne, rare”.^[27]
• 1611 – Covarrubias defines it as the opposite of thick.^[28]
• 1817 – the Academy marks the sense “rare” as obsolete.^[18]
• 1884 – the Academy derives it from Latin rallus.^[7]

Meanings

Adjective

1. sparse, thin: having its parts further apart than usual, especially of hair, trees or plants: Tiene la barba rala y canosa.^[2][29][1]
2. (obsolete) rare, uncommon.^[2][1]
3. (Central America, Puerto Rico, Peru, Bolivia) Of coffee or an infusion, weak, too watery.^[22][23]
4. (Nicaragua, Costa Rica) Of cloth, see-through.^[22]
5. (Canary Islands) Runny, not thick.^[25]

Noun

1. (Cuba) A field of sugar cane that has come up with many gaps.^[24][5]

Word family

• ralear
• raleza
• enralecer

Related words

• raro
• rareza
• Latin rārus
• Portuguese ralo
• Asturian ralu

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g 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. ralo
3. ^ a b c d Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. raro
4. ^ García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. art. 5438
5. ^ 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. 4, 786
6. ^ Battaner Arias, Paz (dir.) (2017), Diccionario general de la lengua española VOX, Barcelona: Larousse Editorial, p. s.v. ralo
7. ^ a b c Real Academia Española (1884), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 12th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Gregorio Hernando (the first Academy edition with etymologies), p. 895
8. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1899), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 13th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de los Sres. Hernando y Compañía, p. 840
9. ^ a b Alemany y Bolufer, José (1917), Diccionario de la lengua española, Barcelona: Ramón Sopena, p. 1411
10. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. s.v. rārus
11. ^ Academia de la Llingua Asturiana (2000), Diccionariu de la Llingua Asturiana, Uviéu: ALLA; online at https://mas.academiadelallingua.com/diccionariu, p. s.v. ralu
12. ^ Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. 2825
13. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
14. ^ 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
15. ^ 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. ralo
16. ^ Diccionario del Español Medieval electrónico (DEMel), data publication 2026 (CC BY-SA), Universität Rostock, p. s.v. ralo
17. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 5, 485
18. ^ a b c Real Academia Española (1817), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 5th ed., Madrid: Imprenta Real, p. 726
19. ^ 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. ralo
20. ^ Grupo IATEXT, Universidad de Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, AMERLEX: corpus of americanisms in early texts on the Americas (online database), p. s.v. ralo
21. ^ Henríquez Ureña, Pedro (2015), Obras completas, vol. 12: 1936–1940 III, ed. Miguel D. Mena, Santo Domingo: Ministerio de Cultura, p. 52
22. ^ a b c Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española (2010), Diccionario de americanismos, Lima: Santillana; online at https://www.asale.org/damer, p. s.v. ralo
23. ^ a b Academia Puertorriqueña de la Lengua Española; Universidad de Puerto Rico, Tesoro lexicográfico del español de Puerto Rico, https://tesoro.pr, p. s.v. ralo
24. ^ a b Ortiz, Fernando (1923), Un catauro de cubanismos: apuntes lexicográficos, La Habana, p. 59
25. ^ a b Academia Canaria de la Lengua (2010), Diccionario básico de canarismos, Santa Cruz de Tenerife; online at https://www.academiacanarialengua.org, p. s.v. ralo
26. ^ Nehama, Joseph (1977), Dictionnaire du judéo-espagnol, Madrid: CSIC, p. s.v. ralo
27. ^ Percyvall, Richard (1591), Bibliothecae Hispanicae pars altera: containing a dictionarie in Spanish, English and Latine, London: John Jackson for Richard Watkins, p. 199
28. ^ Covarrubias Orozco, Sebastián de (1611), Tesoro de la lengua castellana o española, Madrid: Luis Sánchez (Biblioteca Wordkers transcription, CC BY 4.0), p. 1245
29. ^ Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. ralo