îmbăgiua

Forms

îmbăgiua (present îmbăgiuez, past participle îmbăgiuat), 1st conjugation; regional îmbăgioa.^[1][2]

Etymology

The origin is uncertain.^[2][3] Drăganu proposed a lost noun *îmbăgea that would continue inherited from Vulgar Latin *ambagella, a diminutive of Latin ambāgēs (“roundabout way, evasion”);^[3][1][4] DA accepted it as a possibility, and MDA2 and Wiktionary give the same etymon.^[3][1][4] Ciorănescu rejects this derivation and calls the word of unknown origin.^[2] The Latin noun is formed on ambi- (“around”) and agō (“to drive, act”).^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

DA's first records are from northern Transylvania and northern Moldavia: G. T. Kirileanu's material in Convorbiri literare and Drăganu's article in the first volume of Dacoromania.^[3][1] There it means “to keep someone talking, to confuse”.^[3]

Semantic evolution

From “to string someone along with words” it came to mean “to hinder”, “to lure”, “to deceive” and “to seduce”.^[3][1][5] The participle îmbăgiuat was also said of unsettled weather.^[3]

Meanings

Verb

1. (regional) To keep someone talking, to string along; to confuse.^[1][3]
2. (regional) To hinder someone in their work.^[1][3]
3. (regional) To lure, to deceive.^[1][2][4]
4. (regional) To seduce.^[1][3]

Usage notes

DA also records the dialect forms îmbăjua and îmbăjoa, and treats îmbăgina as a misprint;^[3][2] Ciorănescu gives îmbăgina as a variant.^[3][2]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 1, 1179
2. ^ a b c d e f Ciorănescu, Alexandru (1958–1966), Diccionario etimológico rumano, La Laguna: Universidad de La Laguna (Romanian ed.: Dicționarul etimologic al limbii române, București: Saeculum, 2001), p. s.v. îmbăgiua
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Academia Română (1913–1949), Dicționarul limbii române (DA), ed. Sextil Pușcariu, tom I (A–B, C, D–De) and tom II (F–I, J–Lojniță), București: Socec / Universul / Monitorul Oficial și Imprimeriile Statului; page scans at cflr-scans.solirom.ro, p. s.v. îmbăgiua
4. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
5. ^ Bulgăr, Gheorghe; Constantinescu-Dobridor, Gheorghe (2002), Dicționar de arhaisme și regionalisme, 2 vols., București: Saeculum Vizual, p. s.v. îmbăgiua