farolito

noun

fa·​ro·​li·​to ˌfer-ə-ˈlē-tō 

ˌfär-

plural farolitos

: a lantern that typically consists of a candle set in sand inside a paper bag and that is traditionally used in Christmas celebrations in the southwestern U.S.

called also luminaria

Word History

Etymology

borrowed from American Spanish, diminutive of Spanish farol "lantern, lamp," probably borrowed from early modern Catalan faró, borrowed from Middle Greek pharós, blend of Greek pháros "lighthouse" (from Pháros, lighthouse on the island of Pharos in the harbor of Alexandria, Egypt) and phanós "torch"

Note: This is essentially Joan Coromines's explanation of farol in Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico. He speculates that Spanish speakers would have appended /n/ to faró (by assuming that Catalan had dropped /n/ here?), but the resulting *farón would have been taken as an augmentative, inappropriate given the relatively small size of a lantern or lamp; hence a new variant farol would have arisen with a more appropriate diminutive sense. The hypothesis is not entirely convincing, in part because -ol, a diminutive suffix in Catalan, is not really a productive suffix at all in Spanish. Additionally, as Coromines admits, he could find no evidence of a Byzantine Greek form pharós in the lexica available to him.

First Known Use

1941, in the meaning defined above