Other forms: palfreys
A palfrey is a gentle riding horse for ordinary travel. Ride a palfrey, a lady's palfrey, mounted on a palfrey.
It was the everyday horse of the medieval world, valued for a smooth ambling gait rather than for speed or size, and it cost more than a warhorse for that reason. The word survives only in historical writing.
1nounpalfreyA gentle riding horse for ordinary travel.
“The lady rode a white palfrey, while her knights followed on their warhorses.”
palfrey is a horse.
Latin paraveredus means a post horse, from Greek para plus a Gaulish word for a horse.
Ancient Greek
παρά
Latin
paraverēdus — post horse, spare horse
Old French
palefroi
Anglo-Norman
palefrei — steed
Middle English
palfrey
English, today
palfrey
From Middle English palfrey, from Anglo-Norman palefrei (“steed”), from Old French palefroi, palefreid, from Latin paraverēdus (“post horse, spare horse”), from Ancient Greek παρά + Latin verēdus (“post horse”), from cel-gau werēdos (“horse”) (compare Welsh gorwydd (“horse”)), from Proto-Celtic uɸoreidos (“horse”). a doublet of prad. Compare Dutch paard and German Pferd.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA