acid

Forms

acid m or n (feminine singular acidă, masculine plural acizi, feminine/neuter plural acide); noun acid m (plural acizi)^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from French acide and also borrowed from Latin acidus (“sour”), the Latin adjective used as a chemical term in Medieval Latin.^[2][3][4][1] Tiktin and the DA give French alone, Scriban Latin alone.^[5][6][7] The Latin word is formed on aceō (“to be sour”), of a root meaning “sharp” also seen in acus (“needle”), aciēs (“edge”), acētum (“vinegar”) and ācer (“sharp”).^[2][8] French has had the adjective since 1545, first of a fruit.^[9]

The same Latin family reached Romanian by older roads: ac and acru are inherited, and oțet came through Old Church Slavonic.^[10]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is of 1813, in a text by Maior, in the plural acide, probably stressed ácide, for the chemical substance.^[2][5] MDA2 dates the word only from Petru Poni's chemistry course of 1891.^[4]

Semantic evolution

The word came in as a chemical term.^[2] It was first a neuter noun with the plural acide, as in Barcianu 1886 and Damé; the masculine, already in Negulici, has the plural acizi in Poni's chemistry course and in Tiktin, and is now the only form of the noun.^{[2][6][11][12][13][5]} Older texts also have the variant ațid and, after Latin, the stress ácid.^[2][6][7]

The adjective “sour, tart” is in Costinescu in 1870 and Scriban gives it of fruit;^[14][7][5] Tiktin notes that it is used mostly figuratively.^[14][7][5] The figurative sense is “biting, caustic”, of a critic or a remark.^[2][15] Drug slang uses the noun for LSD.^[16]

The derivatives came mostly as French chemical terms: aciditate and acidula in 1840, acidifica in 1848, antiacid in 1859, acidoză in 1928.^[2]

Timeline

• 1813 – the plural acide in a text by Maior, the first record.^[2][5]
• 1840 – aciditate and acidula in the dictionary of Poenaru, Aaron and Hill.^[2]
• 1848 – acid as a chemical term in Negulici;^[11][2] acidifica “to acidify”.^[11][2]
• 1859 – antiacid.^[2]
• 1870 – the adjective “sour” and compounds such as acid camforic in Costinescu.^[14]
• 1891 – the masculine plural acizi in Petru Poni's chemistry course.^[4][6]
• 1928 – acidoză “acidosis”.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. (chemistry) An acid: a substance with a sour taste and a sharp smell that turns blue litmus paper red and forms a salt with a base: acid sulfuric “sulphuric acid”.^[3][17]
2. (slang) LSD.^[16]

Adjective

1. Having the properties of an acid; sour, tart, sharp.^[3][18]
2. (figurative) caustic, biting: bringing out unpleasant or painful things.^[15][2]

Word family

• acidifica
• aciditate
• acidoză
• acidula
• antiacid

Related words

• acru
• Latin acidus

Usage notes

The noun is masculine, with the plural acizi; the older neuter with the plural acide survives in the feminine and neuter plural of the adjective.^[3][2]

References

1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p 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. acid
3. ^ a b c d DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 7
4. ^ a b c Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 1, 8
5. ^ 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. acíd
6. ^ a b c d 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. acid
7. ^ a b c d Scriban, August (1939), Dicționaru limbii românești (etimologii, înțelesuri, exemple, citațiuni, arhaizme, neologizme, provincializme), Iași: Presa Bună, p. 65
8. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
9. ^ Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
10. ^ Graur, Alexandru (1980), Cuvinte înrudite, București: Editura Științifică și Enciclopedică
11. ^ a b c Negulici, I. D. (1848), Vocabular romînesc de toate vorbele streine întroduse pînă acum în limba romînească și de toate cuvintele ce s-ar mai putea introduce încă, București, p. s.v. acid
12. ^ Barcianu, Sava Popovici (1886), Dicționar român-germân și germân-român, revised by D. P. Barcianu, part I: român-germân, Sibiu: Institut tipografic, p. 1
13. ^ Damé, Frédéric (1893–1895), Nouveau dictionnaire roumain-français, 4 vols., Bucarest: Imprimerie de l'État, p. s.v. acid
14. ^ a b c Costinescu, Ion (1870), Vocabularu romano-francesu, 2 vols., Bucuresci, p. 1, 9
15. ^ a b Marcu, Florin (2000), Marele dicționar de neologisme, București: Saeculum Vizual, p. s.v. acid
16. ^ a b Volceanov, George (2007), Dicționar de argou al limbii române, București: Niculescu, p. s.v. acid
17. ^ Macrea, Dimitrie; Petrovici, Emil (coord.) (1955–1957), Dicționarul limbii romîne literare contemporane, 4 vols., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 1, 12
18. ^ Academia Republicii Populare Romîne (1958), Dicționarul limbii romîne moderne, București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 5