balẽa

See also: balea and baleá

Old Galician-Portuguese

Etymology

Inherited from Latin ballaena, variant of bālaena (“a whale”), from Ancient Greek φάλαινα (phálaina), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰleh₃- (“to inflate, blow, swell”), from *bʰel- (“to bloom”).

Cognate with Old Spanish ballena and Mozarabic balléna.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /baˈlẽ.a/
• Rhymes: -ẽa

Noun

balẽa f

1. whale
   • 1291, E. Cal Pardo, editor, Colección diplomática medieval do arquivo da catedral de Mondoñedo, Santiago: Consello da Cultura Galega, page 79:

     et disso que despenderan en tres ueces que fora a San Cibrao a pinnorar a balea et a entregala ccc mor. et disso que ennas pinnaças et no trager da balea metera c mor. et quandor foronon o maestreescola et don Pedro Dias a San Cibrao con quinentos ommes et con xxx a caualo por tomar esta balea aos ommes do infante

     and he said that he spent, in three times that he went to San Cibrao to pawn the whale and to deliver it, 300 mor.; and he said that in the pinnaces and in the delivery of the whale he spent 100 mor.; and when the schoolmaster and lord Pedro Dias went to San Cibrao with five hundred peons and 30 mounted men, for seizing the whale from the prince's men

2. a large marine fish

Descendants

• Galician: balea
• Portuguese: baleia (see there for further descendants)

Further reading

• Universo Cantigas - "balẽa"