adăpa

Forms

adăpa (third-person singular present adapă, past participle adăpat, third-person subjunctive adape) 1st conjugation^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin adaquō (“to supply with water, to give to drink”), formed in Latin on aqua (“water”).^{[2][3][4][5][1]} The Latin verb meant “to water” plants and animals and, in the passive, “to be brought to drink”.^[6][7] Ciorănescu cites Pușcariu, the REW and the DA for the etymology.^[3][8]

The verb survives in all four branches: Aromanian adap, Megleno-Romanian dap and Istro-Romanian dapå.^{[9][10][11][2]} Its Romance cognates include Italian adacquare, Sardinian abbare, Occitan azaigar and Old French aever.^[3][12]

Earliest recorded meaning

DELR dates the first record to the Psaltirea Hurmuzaki of about 1500–1520, in the sense “to give water to drink”.^[2] The Coresi and Scheiană psalters of 1570 and 1573 have the same verb in Psalm 64, adăpași “you watered”.^[13] Tiktin's first date is the Slavonic–Romanian Gospel of 1551–1553, in Matthew 25:37, “thirsty, and gave you drink”: „setos și te-am adăpat”.^[14]

Semantic evolution

The DA takes “to lead to water” as the basic sense, with the aim, to let drink, contained in it; for this reason the verb belongs to animals, which must be led to water, and not to people.^[15] Alecsandri makes a character say that only cattle se adapă, while people drink.^[15] In the old language it was still used of people who were given drink, as in the Gospel passage;^[14] Tiktin finds that use only in poetry later on.^[14]

The verb was also used of watering the soil: the Bible of 1688 has a river going out of Eden „ca să adape grădina” “to water the garden”.^[14] An old sense “to poison”, now rare, Ciorănescu explains by the closeness of “drink” and “poison”, as in French poison from Latin pōtiō.^[3] Tiktin quotes Zilot's chronicle: „zic că l-au fost adăpat” “they say he had been given poison”.^[14] The reflexive a se adăpa “to drink” is said of animals, and figuratively of drawing on a source of knowledge.^[16][17]

Timeline

• c. 1500–1520 – adăpa in the Psaltirea Hurmuzaki, the first record.^[2][18]
• 1551–1553 – the Slavonic–Romanian Gospel of Sibiu, of giving drink to the thirsty.^[14]
• 1582 – adăpătoare “watering place for cattle” in the Palia de la Orăștie.^[2]
• 1640 – adăpător “that gives to drink”.^[2]
• c. 1650 – adăpătură “watering” in the Anonymus Caransebesiensis.^[2]
• 1688 – the Bucharest Bible, Genesis 24:14: „cămilele ți le voiu adăpa” “I will water your camels”.^[14][19]
• 1853 – the verbal noun adăpat.^[2]

Meanings

Verb

1. To give water to an animal, to water cattle or horses: Seara adăpăm caii la râu. “In the evening we water the horses at the river.”^[5][4]
2. (reflexive, of animals) To drink water.^[5][1]
3. (figurative) To give someone a drink other than water;^[4][17] (reflexive) to draw on a source: a se adăpa la izvoarele culturii “to drink at the springs of culture”.^[4][17]
4. (of the soil) To soak, to wet.^[4][20]
5. (regional, dated) To poison.^[4][3]

Word family

• adăpat
• adăpătoare
• adăpător
• adăpătură
• adăpare

Related words

• apă
• Aromanian adap
• Latin adaquō

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h 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. adăpa
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. adăpa
4. ^ a b c d e f Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 1, 14
5. ^ a b c DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 12
6. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
7. ^ Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
8. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 147
9. ^ Papahagi, Tache (1963), Dicționarul dialectului aromân, general și etimologic, București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 55
10. ^ Saramandu, Nicolae (coord.) et al. (2010–), Dicționarul dialectului meglenoromân, general și etimologic, fascicles in Fonetică și dialectologie XXIX–, p. 171
11. ^ Kovačec, August (1998), Istrorumunjsko-hrvatski rječnik (s gramatikom i tekstovima), Pula
12. ^ Candrea, I.-A.; Densusianu, Ov. (1907–1914), Dicționarul etimologic al limbii române: elementele latine (A–Putea), București, p. 14
13. ^ 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 64:11
14. ^ a b c d e f g Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. adăpa
15. ^ a b 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. adăpa
16. ^ Macrea, Dimitrie; Petrovici, Emil (coord.) (1955–1957), Dicționarul limbii romîne literare contemporane, 4 vols., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 1, 21
17. ^ a b c Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan” (1998), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române, 2nd ed., București: Univers Enciclopedic, p. 1, 13
18. ^ 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 59:3
19. ^ Biblia, adecă Dumnezeiasca Scriptură a ceii vechi și a ceii noao leage, București, 1688 (ed. 1988, tricentennial edition), p. Gn 24:14
20. ^ Academia Republicii Populare Romîne (1958), Dicționarul limbii romîne moderne, București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 1, 8