Etymograph

English

oriel

Oriel comes from Old French oriol ‘gallery, corridor’.

  1. Old Frenchc. 842–1400oriol‘gallery, corridor’
  2. Middle Englishc. 1150–1500oriel
  3. Englishearliest quotation 1831oriel

attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed deepest recorded ancestor

Earlier history uncertain.

Lineage

  1. Old Frenchc. 842–1400oriol‘gallery, corridor’
  2. Middle Englishc. 1150–1500oriel
  3. Englishearliest quotation 1831oriel

Earliest quotation: 1831, Letitia Elizabeth Landon, London: Henry Colburn and Richard Bentley: “The middle window of the oriel before her, just…”

The story

From Middle English oriel, from Old French oriol (‘gallery, corridor’), Late Latin oriolum (‘portico, hall’), probably from Latin aureolus (‘gilded’), applied to an apartment decorated with gilding.

Linked words

through Proto-Indo-European *h₂ews- ‘to dawn, become light, become red’

air, east, plane, exhaust, aerial, aura, aurora, malaria, aero, aria, austral, 63 more

through Latin aurum ‘gold’

or, aurum, 20 more

through Latin aureus ‘golden’

aureus, aurelia, 7 more

through Old French oriol ‘gallery, corridor’

oriole

Today it means

noun A large polygonal recess in a building, such as a bay window, forming a protrusion on the outer wall.

Language periods are conventional ranges, not dates for this word.

Etymograph / Old French oriol / oriel

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