rubio

Forms

rubio (feminine rubia, masculine plural rubios, feminine plural rubias)^[1] Old Spanish usually wrote ruvio (Cobas ruvias in 972, Peña ruvia in 1118); the spelling rubio of the 10th-century charters is half Latin.^[2] Aragonese has royo “reddish”, also found in place names of La Rioja, Burgos and Soria, and an intermediate ruyo was heard in Soria, Burgos and Ávila.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin rubeus (“reddish, red”), which the Old Spanish texts mostly spell ruvio.^[2][4][5][1] The Latin adjective (also robeus) is formed from rubeō (“to be red”).^[1][6][7] The same root gives ruber (“red”), which de Vaan traces to *h₁rudʰ-ró-, an adjective “red”.^[8] Wiktionary sets out the root as Proto-Indo-European *h₁rewdʰ- (“red”).^[1]

The same Latin word is Portuguese ruivo, Catalan roig, French rouge and Romanian roib, the last meaning a chestnut horse.^[9][3] Castilian kept the Latin group /bj/ in ⟨rubio⟩, as in lluvia and gavia, while the Aragonese outcome royo turned it into a palatal consonant, as French and Catalan did.^[2] Corominas holds that the Castilian form is the regular popular one and not a learned treatment, as Menéndez Pidal had thought.^[2] He also rejects the older derivation from rūbidus (“dark red”), proposed by Cabrera and by Richardson, because that word left no descendants in Romance.^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

The DCECH's first record is a Leonese charter of 950, and another of 964 has uno bove rubio “a reddish ox”.^[2][4] The DEMel's first Spanish record of the adjective is a charter of 1086.^[10] Already in the Middle Ages the colour was roughly the present one, now and then closer to the Latin “reddish”: a riddle in the Libro de Apolonio sets it beside black, white and red, nin es ruvio nin negro, nin blanco nin bermejo “it is neither fair nor black, neither white nor red”.^[2]

Semantic evolution

Latin rubeus named a reddish hue, and Spanish moved the word towards the lighter, golden end of the range, leaving “red” to rojo and “reddish” to rojizo.^[11][12] Nebrija glossed ruvia cosa with Latin flavus and ruvio encendido with russus, fulvus.^[2] Covarrubias defined it in 1611 as a fiery red colour, and Autoridades as light red or the colour of gold.^[13][14] The Academy's 1843 dictionary added the fish, the gurnard, and its 1869 edition said that the word is used especially of hair and of the people who have it.^[15][16]

Later senses name light things: light tobacco, lager beer, and in Spain the old golden one-peseta coin.^[5][17][12] The feminine noun rubia kept the Latin “reddish” as the name of the madder plant, recorded by Nebrija, whose root gives a red dye.^[2][4] In Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic a rubio is a reddish fighting cock, and in Bolivia rubio has meant “drunk”.^[18][19][20] In León the word is applied to a cow or sheep with reddish markings on the face.^[21]

Timeline

• 950 – first record, in a Leonese charter.^[2][4]
• 964 – uno bove rubio “a reddish ox” in another charter.^[2]
• 972 – the place name Cobas ruvias shows the usual Old Spanish spelling.^[2]
• 1086 – the DEMel's first record in a Spanish text, a charter.^[10]
• 1532 – first record from the Americas, in Mexico: people who were mostly fair.^[22]
• 1605 – the derivative rubión appears in the Quijote.^[2][4]
• 1611 – Covarrubias defines the colour as a fiery red.^[13]
• 1843 – the Academy's dictionary adds the fish.^[15]
• 1884 – the Academy's first etymology derives it from Latin ruber; today's dictionary gives rubeus.^[23][5]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Of a colour: golden yellow, like gold; also used as a noun for the colour.^[5][17]
2. Of hair: blond, fair: Llevaba el pelo rubio recogido.^[5][1]
3. Of a person or animal: having blond hair; also a noun, a blond person: Su hermano es el rubio de la foto.^[5][1]
4. Of tobacco or beer: light in colour and mild.^[5][17][12]
5. (colloquial, Spain, rare) Of the old Spanish one-peseta coin: golden; also as a feminine noun, una rubia.^[5]

Noun

1. (zoology) A gurnard, a red-backed sea fish with a hard, plated head and blue pectoral fins.^[5][1][24]
2. Light tobacco: Antes fumaba negro y ahora solo rubio.^[5]
3. (bullfighting, in the plural) The centre of the cross on the bull's back.^[5][17]
4. (feminine) A very small, edible freshwater fish spotted brown and red.^[5]
5. (feminine, Spain, rare) An estate car with a body partly of unpainted wood.^[5][17]
6. (Puerto Rico, Dominican Republic) A reddish gamecock.^[18][19][25]

Word family

• rubión
• enrubiar
• rubial
• boquirrubio

Related words

• rubí
• rubor
• rúbrica
• rubicundo
• rubéola
• royo
• Latin rubeus
• Portuguese ruivo
• Catalan roig

Usage notes

The phrase rubio platino describes very light blond hair.^[5][26] The Aragonese royo keeps the older sense “reddish”.^[2][4]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 5, 80
3. ^ a b García de Diego, Vicente (1985), Diccionario etimológico español e hispánico, 2nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe (1st ed. 1954), p. art. 5756
4. ^ a b c d e f Corominas, Joan (1973), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua castellana, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. rubio
5. ^ 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. rubio
6. ^ Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press, p. s.v. rubeus
7. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. s.v. rubeus
8. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill, p. s.v. ruber
9. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. s.v. rubeus
10. ^ a b Diccionario del Español Medieval electrónico (DEMel), data publication 2026 (CC BY-SA), Universität Rostock, p. s.v. rubio
11. ^ Bénaben, Michel (2000), Dictionnaire étymologique de l'espagnol, Paris: Ellipses, p. s.v. rubio
12. ^ a b c Battaner Arias, Paz (dir.) (2017), Diccionario general de la lengua española VOX, Barcelona: Larousse Editorial, p. s.v. rubio
13. ^ a b Covarrubias Orozco, Sebastián de (1611), Tesoro de la lengua castellana o española, Madrid: Luis Sánchez (Biblioteca Wordkers transcription, CC BY 4.0), p. 1273
14. ^ Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. s.v. rubio
15. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1843), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 9th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Francisco María Fernández, p. 645
16. ^ Real Academia Española (1869), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 11th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de Don Manuel Rivadeneyra, p. 691
17. ^ a b c d e Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. rubio
18. ^ 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. rubio
19. ^ a b Academia Dominicana de la Lengua; Instituto Guzmán Ariza de Lexicografía (2024), Diccionario del español dominicano, 2nd ed., online at https://ded.igalex.org, p. s.v. rubio
20. ^ Santamaría, Francisco J. (1942), Diccionario general de americanismos, 3 vols., México: Pedro Robredo, p. 46
21. ^ Le Men Loyer, Janick (2002–2012), Léxico del leonés actual, 4 vols., León: Centro de Estudios e Investigación San Isidoro; electronic version, Universidad de León, p. s.v. rubio
22. ^ 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. rubio
23. ^ Real Academia Española (1884), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 12th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Gregorio Hernando (the first Academy edition with etymologies), p. 944
24. ^ 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. rubio
25. ^ Academia Puertorriqueña de la Lengua Española; Universidad de Puerto Rico, Tesoro lexicográfico del español de Puerto Rico, https://tesoro.pr, p. s.v. rubio
26. ^ Real Academia Española (2001), Diccionario de la lengua española, 22nd ed., Madrid: Espasa-Calpe, p. s.v. rubio