acorda

Forms

acorda (third-person singular present acordă or acordează, past participle acordat), first conjugation^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from French accorder, a neologism of the late 18th century.^[2][3][4][1] Tiktin names Italian accordare as the source instead, and the neologism dictionaries give French with Italian or Latin beside it.^[5][6][7] The French verb comes from Vulgar Latin *accordō, which replaced the prefix of Latin concordō (“to agree”) with ad-.^[1]

DEX treats the senses “to grant”, “to make agree in grammar” and “to tune” as one verb, conjugated two ways: ⟨acord⟩ for the first two and ⟨acordez⟩ for tuning.^[3][8] Wiktionary gives both senses the same French source.^[1] DELR records an old variant acordarisi, with the verbal suffix of the Greek loans.^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

DELR and Tiktin date the first record to 1794, in the Vienna calendar.^[2][5] MDA2's first record is later: Hasdeu's critical history of the Romanians, 1875, where Vlaicu Vodă grants a privilege to the merchants of Poland.^[4][8]

Semantic evolution

The DA gave two main senses: “to bring into harmony” (grammatical agreement and the tuning of instruments) and “to grant”.^[8] It also noted that the present acord was used mostly for granting, acordez mostly as a musical term.^[8] A technical sense, to set the frequency of one device equal to that of another, was added later.^[2][3] Șăineanu also recorded the sense “to concede, admit”: acord că n-am dreptate “I grant that I am wrong”.^[9]

The family grew in the 19th century, mostly from French: acordabil and acordor are recorded from 1848, dezacorda from about 1832.^[2]

Timeline

• 1794 – the first record, in the Vienna calendar.^[2][5]
• c. 1832 – dezacorda “to put out of tune”, in Iordache Golescu.^[2]
• 1839 – acordator “tuner of instruments”, in Vaillant's dictionary.^[2]
• 1848 – acordabil and acordor in Negulici's dictionary of neologisms.^[2]
• 1875 – “to grant”, in Hasdeu's critical history of the Romanians.^[4][8]

Meanings

Verb

1. To grant, to give (a right, a distinction, attention, a favour); to confer.^[3][2][1]
2. (grammar) To make words agree in gender, number and case;^[3][4] (reflexive) to agree.^[3][4]
3. (physics, technology) To set the frequency of a device or system equal to that of another; to tune.^[3][2]
4. (music) To bring the sounds of an instrument to the right pitch; in this sense the present is acordez.^[3][4][1]

Word family

• acordabil
• acordator

Related words

• acord
• acordor
• acordaj
• dezacorda
• French accorder

Usage notes

The verb has two present tenses: acord in the senses “to grant” and “to make agree”, acordez in the senses of tuning.^[3][4]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k 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. acord
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 1, 8
4. ^ a b c d e f g Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 1, 10
5. ^ a b c Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. acordá
6. ^ Marcu, Florin; Maneca, Constant (1986), Dicționar de neologisme, 3rd ed., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Socialiste România, p. s.v. acorda
7. ^ Marcu, Florin (2000), Marele dicționar de neologisme, București: Saeculum Vizual, p. s.v. acorda
8. ^ a b c d e 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. acorda
9. ^ Șăineanu, Lazăr (1929), Dicționar universal al limbei române, 6th ed., Craiova: Scrisul Românesc, p. 1, 5