ruelle

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“
Often the ruelle is like a tunnel, for the houses are built right over it on arches, and it is so dark that you cannot see in front of you.

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Definitions (3)

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  1. 1. The space between a bed and the wall. And wo in winter-tyme with wakynge a nyghtes To ryse to the ruel to rocke the cradel. Piers Plouman (C), x. 79. The space thus left between the bed and the curtains was perhaps what was originally called in French the ruelle … of the bed, a term which was afterwards given to the space between the curtains of the bed and the wall. Wright, Homes of Other Days, quoted by Skeat, [Notes on Piers Plowman, p. 122.
  2. Hence, a bedchamber in which persons of quality, especially ladies, in France during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries held receptions in the morning, to which persons distinguished for learning, wit, etc., as well as those constituting society, were invited; hence, such a reception, where the events of the day, etc., were discussed. In the seventeenth century the character of the ruelles was distinctively literary and artistic; but in the following century they degenerated into mere occasions for gossip and frivolity. The poet who flourished in the scene is damned in the ruelle. Dryden, Ded. of the Æneid. A Voice persuades. Whether on Theatres loud Strains we hear, Or in Ruelles some soft Egyptian Air. Congreve, tr. of Ovid's Art of Love. The lady received her visitors reposing on that throne of beauty, a bed placed in an alcove; the toilet was magnificently arranged. The space between the bed and the wall was called the Ruelle, the diminutive of la Rue; and in this narrow street, or “Fop's alley,” walked the favoured. I. D'Israeli, Lit. Char. Men of Genius, p. 413.

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Examples (43)

  • Often the ruelle is like a tunnel, for the houses are built right over it on arches, and it is so dark that you cannot see in front of you. —  Riviera Towns
  • Their fashionable friends (_alcovistes_) took their places between the bed and the wall, and thus the name ruelle came to be given to all fashionable assemblies. —  The Pretentious Young Ladies
  • Monsieur in another armchair; the Princesses upon stools, Monseigneur and all the other Princes standing The King, wishing to retire, went and fed his dogs; then said good night, passed into his chamber to the 'ruelle' of his bed, where he said his prayers, as in the morning, then undressed. —  Court Memoirs of France Series — Complete
  • The aged Marquise, true to her early tastes, continued to receive her friends in her ruelle, and her salon had a brief revival when the Duchesse de Montausier returned from the provinces, after the second Fronde; but its freshness had faded with its draperies of blue and gold. —  The Women of the French Salons
  • A number of plates were found in the ruelle of his bed after his death. —  Court Memoirs of France Series — Complete
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Etymologies (1)

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  1. Middle English ruel, from Old French ruelle, French ruelle, older rule, a little street, path, lane; ruelle du lict, or later simply ruelle, the space left between a bed and the wall; hence later an alcove in a bedroom; diminutive of rue, street, path, = Provencal Spanish Portuguese rua = Old Italian ruga, from Middle Latin ruga, also rua, place, street, path, perhaps from Latin ruga, wrinkle: see ruga, ruge. The Middle Latin ruta, rutta, a way, is a reflex of the Roman forms of rupta, a way, path: see rut, route.
 

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