Middle English. From Anglo-Norman puralee, puralé, purallé, poralé, poralee, pouralee, etc., pacing, measuring, drawing of boundaries, bounds, limit, tract of land between the wider bounds of a forest and the restricted bounds as fixed by perambulation from puraler to bring about, to bring to a conclusion, to perambulate, measure from pur + aler to go; compare Old French poraler, pouraler, puraler to travel through, to pursue (a person or thing), to search for (a person or thing), also in Old French as paraler. Compare post-classical Latin porale, porallum, purale, puralea, purialea, porellia. Compare also post-classical Latin perambulatio.