[Sp., = It. giornata, F. journée, JOURNEY, lit. day’s space, work or journey; in Sp. also ‘an act in a Comedy’ (Minsheu, 1599).]
† 1. An act of a play; a book or canto of a poem. Obs.
1656. Flecknoe (title), Diarium, or Journall; divided into 12 Jornadas in Burlesque Rhyme or Drolling Verse.
1667. Dryden, Ess. Dram. Poesie, Dram. Wks. 1725, I. 30. The Spaniards at this day allow but three Acts, which they call Jornadas, to a Play.
1833. Longf., Outre-Mer, Pr. Wks. 1886, I. 197. The second act, or jornada, discovers Eusebio as the leader of a band of robbers.
2. In Mexico, etc.: A march or journey performed in a day; spec. a journey across a tract where there is no water and consequently no place to halt; also, the waterless district thus traversed.
1850. B. Taylor, Eldorado, v. (1862), 49. The route led in a zigzag direction across the mountain chain from one watering-place to another, with frequent jornadas (journeys without water).
1851. Mayne Reid, Scalp Hunt., xlii. 327. The events that occurred to us in the passage of that terrible jornada.
1859. Marcy, Prairie Trav., xi. 52. In some localities 50 or 60 miles, and even greater distances, are frequently traversed without water; these long stretches are called by the Mexicans ‘journadas,’ or day’s journeys.
