șase

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin sex (“six”).^[2][3][1][4] DEX starts from a variant Vulgar Latin *sess, and Capidan from *sesse.^[5][6] The word survives in all four branches: Aromanian șase, Megleno-Romanian șasi and Istro-Romanian șǫse.^[2][7][6] Its Romance cognates include Italian sei, French six, Catalan sis, Spanish seis and Portuguese seis.^[2]

Ciorănescu finds the sounds hard to explain.^[2] The final vowel is usually put down to the numerals around it, quīnque and septem, which is Tiktin's view;^[2][4] Ciorănescu also allows an inserted vowel like the one in the Greek of southern Italy.^[2][4] Wiktionary takes the Latin word from Proto-Indo-European *swéḱs, but Kluge notes that the Proto-Indo-European form is disputed, since other languages point to *seḱs.^[1][8]

Earliest recorded meaning

Tiktin's first record is a Gospel text of 1551–1553, in Matthew 13:8.^[4] MDA2 and the DLR cite a text of about 1550–1600 printed in Gaster's chrestomathy, „Amu lăsalu voao șase zile de lucru” “now I have left you six days of work”.^[3][9]

Semantic evolution

In compounds the numeral shrinks to șai-: șaisprezece “sixteen”, șaizeci “sixty”.^[2][4] Tiktin compares Italian sei or an analogy with doi- and trei-;^[4] Pușcariu also saw analogy, Pascu a regular outcome of the Latin, and Ciorănescu a dissimilation in fast counting.^[2][4] Moldavian has the variant șese.^[2] In slang the numeral became a warning, “watch out!”, which Ciorănescu finds hard to explain; he compares French vingt-deux, used the same way, and Iordan derived it from șest.^[2]

Timeline

• 1551–1553 – șase in a Gospel text, Matthew 13:8.^[4]
• c. 1550–1600 – șase zile “six days” in a text printed in Gaster's chrestomathy.^[3][9]
• 1649 – șase in Mardarie's Slavonic–Romanian lexicon.^[10]
• 1688 – 76 occurrences in the Bucharest Bible.^[11]

Meanings

Numeral

1. six: the number between five and seven, written 6 or VI; also as a noun, the figure six.^[5][1][3]
2. (slang, as an interjection) Watch out!, look out!^[2][9]

Word family

• șesime
• șaisprezece
• șaizeci

Related words

• Aromanian șase
• Latin sex

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k 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. șase
3. ^ a b c d Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 2, 1088
4. ^ a b c d e f g h Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. șase
5. ^ a b DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 1086
6. ^ a b Capidan, Theodor (1935), Meglenoromânii III: Dicționar meglenoromân, București: Academia Română, p. 283
7. ^ Papahagi, Tache (1963), Dicționarul dialectului aromân, general și etimologic, București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 1001
8. ^ Kluge, Friedrich; Seebold, Elmar (2011), Etymologisches Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache, 25th ed., Berlin / Boston: De Gruyter
9. ^ a b c Academia Română (1965–2010), Dicționarul limbii române (DLR), serie nouă, tom I–XIX, București: Editura Academiei Române, p. s.v. șase
10. ^ Ungureanu, Mădălina; Gînsac, Ana-Maria; Moruz, Alexandru (eds.), eRomLex: The First Romanian Bilingual Dictionaries (17th century), Iași: Universitatea „Alexandru Ioan Cuza”, https://scriptadacoromanica.ro, p. s.v. șase
11. ^ Biblia, adecă Dumnezeiasca Scriptură a ceii vechi și a ceii noao leage, București, 1688 (ed. 1988, tricentennial edition), p. Ex 20:9