acest

Forms

acest m or n (feminine singular această, masculine plural acești, feminine/neuter plural aceste)^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Vulgar Latin *eccum istum, from eccum (“behold him”) and iste (“this, that”).^{[2][3][4][5][1][6]} DEX and MDA2 start from ecce (“behold”) with the same pronoun instead.^[7][8] DELR finds the first likelier, because some deictic adverbs can only be explained with it: acolo (with illōc (“there”)) and acum (with modo (“just now”)).^[2] The initial ⟨a-⟩ may be a Romanian sound change or Latin; the Catalan and Spanish forms with ⟨aqu-⟩ point to a mixture with atque (“and”), and DELR finds a derivation from that conjunction and the pronoun, also considered by Pușcariu and the DA, unlikely in meaning.^[2]

The word survives in all four branches of Romanian: Aromanian aestu, Megleno-Romanian țista and Istro-Romanian țăsta.^[3] Its Romance cognates include Italian questo, Old French cest (whence French ce) and Catalan aquest.^[3][2][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

DELR dates both acest and the pronoun acesta to the Psaltirea Hurmuzaki of the early 16th century.^[2] Tiktin's first record is Neacșu's letter of 1521: „Și aceaste cuvinte să ții domniia-ta la tine” “and keep these words to yourself, Your Lordship”.^[6]

Semantic evolution

The word points to what is near the speaker in space or time, as opposed to acel “that”.^[7][6] With nouns of time it means “current, present”: anul acesta “this year”.^[7][8] Placed after its noun or used as a pronoun it takes the ending -a (acesta, această > aceasta); the old language used acesta before the noun too.^[3][6] DELR lists several explanations of this -a: Latin hāc (“here”) (Drăganu, Rosetti), the model of acela (Pușcariu), or a deictic particle that Hasdeu took from the substrate.^[2]

Old Moldavian had aest and the old language a shorter cest.^[3][2] Tiktin derives est and ist from Latin istum and the popular ăst by analogy with ăl.^[6]

Timeline

• c. 1500 – acest and acesta in the Psaltirea Hurmuzaki, the first records.^[2][9]
• 1521 – aceaste cuvinte “these words” in Neacșu's letter.^[6]
• 1563–1583 – acestași “this same” in the Codicele Voronețean.^[2]

Meanings

Determiner

1. this, these: points to someone or something near the speaker in space or time: această carte “this book”.^[7][8][1]
2. With nouns of time, current, present: săptămâna aceasta “this week”.^[7][8]

Word family

• acesta
• acestași
• acestălalt

Related words

• acel
• Aromanian aestu

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2011–), Dicționarul etimologic al limbii române (DELR), vol. I: A–B (2011), vol. II: C (2015–2018), București: Editura Academiei Române; continued online at delr.lingv.ro, p. s.v. acest
3. ^ a b c d e 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. acest
4. ^ Pușcariu, Sextil (1905), Etymologisches Wörterbuch der rumänischen Sprache I: Lateinisches Element, Heidelberg: Carl Winter, p. 2
5. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 4553
6. ^ a b c d e f Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. acest
7. ^ a b c d e DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 6
8. ^ 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. 1, 7
9. ^ Gînsac, Ana-Maria; Ungureanu, Mădălina; Moruz, Alexandru et al., roPsalt: Re-evaluating the Sixteenth Century Romanian Psalters (aligned corpus), Iași: Universitatea „Alexandru Ioan Cuza”, https://scriptadacoromanica.ro, p. Ps 11:8