[Michael Juster]

Is a "vale" interchangeable with a "valley" or are there subtle differences eluding the good doctor?

[Julie Steiner]

Feeling ambivalent, huh?

For me, the main difference between the two is that I've never heard a living person say "vale" who wasn't referring to an Appalachian folksong.

[Edited to say: Or praying the Rosary--although a lot of the congregation says "valley of tears" these days, instead of the "vale of tears" I learned. Further evidence that the word "vale" tends to strike modern sensibilities as archaic and/or excessively poetic, even to people who seem to have no problem saying "To thee do we send up our sighs, mourning and weeping in this" immediately beforehand.]

[Erik Olson]

A "vale" is nothing but a "valley", though especially one which is comparatively wide and flat. A "valley" is nothing but a "vale", though typically longer, whereas a vale is typically wider. Though the two are interchangeable with only this subtle difference between the one and the other. Both valley and vale usually having a river or stream flowing along its bottom. That's what I understand as far as their sense.

[Brian Allgar]

Julie, you might like to know that from 1964 until a couple of years ago, when the house had to be sold, my family home in England was in a place called Kingston Vale. So it's a word that I've often said, although I know nothing whatsoever about Appalachian folksong.

[Roger Slater]

But that's part of a proper name, Brian, if I'm understanding you correctly.

I agree with Julie. I'd add that "vale" sounds self-consciously poetic and somewhat archaic, something to be avoided in this vale of tears wherein we dwell.

[Julie Steiner]

Originally Posted by Brian Allgar

So it's a word that I've often said

So you were a valedictorian! I suspected as much.

[Douglas G. Brown]

Hereabouts, low, relatively flat land alongside a river is sometimes called an intervale. Usually it is farmland. (What people to the south and west of here call "bottomland".)

Farmington, Maine lies partly on an intervale of the Sandy River. Where it is on each side of the river, it is pluralized as "intervales". I never have heard "vale" used alone, by the way. Farmington also is the home of University of Maine at Farmington, where (mostly non - metrical) poets abound. They probably know more about this than I do.

On the coast, where I live, we just say valley. I never heard the word intervale until I first visited a friend of mine who lives near Farmington.
I suspect that there are other localities that still used intervale and vale, despite their archaic sound.

Otherwise, I agree with Eric.

[Erik Olson]

I can't disagree, except to say there's always exceptions to be found with anything, though that you already knew. A bit of a shame though as I like the sound of vale and like not so much to think another alternative word for valley lost. Poor vale.

[Michael Cantor]

Originally Posted by Julie Steiner

So you were a valedictorian! I suspected as much.

The word "valedictorian" is really only used in the US and Canada. Brian is British. I believe he was a valet. In Kingston.

[Susan Breeding]

Thomas Moore

There is not in the wide world a valley so sweet
As that vale in whose bosom the bright waters meet.

http://www.bartleby.com/270/2/16.html