balaine

Old French

Noun

balaine oblique singular, f (oblique plural balaines, nominative singular balaine, nominative plural balaines)

1. Alternative form of baleine
   • late 12th century, anonymous author, “La Folie de Tristan de Berne”, in Le Roman de Tristan, Champion Classiques edition, →ISBN, page 310, lines 157–8:

     Qui t'engendra? — Uns galerous
     — De que t'ot il? — D'une balaine

     — Who is your father? — A walrus
     — Who did he have you with? — A whale (Tristan is deliberately speaking nonsense in this passage in order to pass for a harmless madman)