via Italian from Latin polenta, literally ‘pearl barley’. In Old and Middle English polenta, borrowed directly from Latin, denoted pearl barley or a kind of porridge made from it or, later, from chestnut or corn meal. In the 17th and 18th cents the word appeared mainly in travel writing, referring to porridge made usually of maize, a staple food of Mediterranean peasants. In modern use the word has been reborrowed from Italian and refers exclusively to fine maize meal as used in Italy