adia

Forms

adia (third-person singular present adie, past participle adiat) 1st conjugation^[1] DELR records a Transylvanian variant aduia and an old variant adii.^[2] Cantemir's Istoria ieroglifică has the old form: „Uleul ... din grumadzi a adii începu” “the hawk began to sway its neck to and fro”.^[3]

Etymology

Its origin is uncertain, and DELR lists several proposals without choosing between them.^[2] DEX and MDA2 take it as inherited from Vulgar Latin *adiliāre, which Candrea traced to the Latin phrase ⟨ducere ilia⟩ or ⟨trahere ilia⟩ “to breathe heavily, to pant”, built on Latin īlia (“flanks, side of the body”); the first sense would then have been “to breathe”.^[4][5][2][6] Ciorănescu finds this unlikely.^[7]

He prefers *adoliāre, a Vulgar Latin form of adoleō (“to burn, turn into vapour”), though the reduction of an intermediate ⟨*aduia⟩ to the attested form is hard, which is why Rosetti rejected it;^[7] Ciorănescu compares the change in baier from ⟨baiur⟩.^[7] The REW and the DA derive it from *aduliāre, from adūlor (“to fawn on, flatter”), which makes “to caress” the first sense.^[8][2][7] Graur argued against this view.^[7] Other proposals have found little support: a Latin ⟨*ad-anheliare⟩ built on anhēlō (“to pant”) (Giuglea), Polish odwiać (“to blow”) (Cihac), and Serbo-Croatian dujem and Bulgarian дуя (duja, “to blow”) (Scriban), which Ciorănescu thinks are loans from Romanian instead.^[7][2]

The verb has a cognate south of the Danube: Aromanian adilju (“to breathe”), with the noun ⟨adil'eare⟩ “breathing; breeze; caress”.^[2][9][10]

Earliest recorded meaning

DELR dates the first record to 1668–1670, in a text it cites as Istorii; in its old uses the verb meant “to touch lightly” and “to move to and fro”.^[2] Tiktin's first record is the Menaion for November of 1698, and MDA2's is Cantemir's Istoria ieroglifică of 1704.^[3][5]

Semantic evolution

Old and regional texts use the verb for a light touch, a caress and a gentle swaying, as in a riddle about a steelyard that is neither dead nor alive and only stirs its tail.^[5][11] In the modern language the main sense is the wind blowing softly, as in a line of Pann's „Și în față ne adie De prin flori mireasmă vie” “and a fresh scent from the flowers breathes into our faces”; the verb is also used of scents that come in light waves and, figuratively, of singing or murmuring in a faint voice.^[4][3] Aromanian kept the sense “to breathe”, which Candrea took to be the first one.^[7][2]

Timeline

• 1668–1670 – first record, in a text DELR cites as Istorii.^[2]
• 1698 – in the Menaion for November.^[3]
• 1704 – in Cantemir's Istoria ieroglifică, MDA2's first record.^[5]
• 1895 – adietor “gently blowing”.^[2]

Meanings

Verb

1. (intransitive, of the wind) To blow gently;^[4][5][1] (rare) to steam;^[4][5][1] (of a scent) to come in light waves: Dinspre grădină adia un miros de tei.^[4][5][1]
2. (intransitive, figurative) To sing in a faint voice; to murmur.^[4][5]
3. (transitive, regional) To caress; to touch lightly.^[4][5]
4. (intransitive) To sway, to move gently.^[4][5]

Word family

• adietor
• adiere

Related words

• Aromanian adilju

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 j 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. adia
3. ^ a b c d Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. adiá
4. ^ a b c d e f g h DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 13
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 1, 16
6. ^ Candrea, I.-A.; Densusianu, Ov. (1907–1914), Dicționarul etimologic al limbii române: elementele latine (A–Putea), București, p. s.v. adia
7. ^ a b c d e f g 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. adia
8. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 204a
9. ^ Papahagi, Tache (1963), Dicționarul dialectului aromân, general și etimologic, București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 57
10. ^ Cunia, Tiberius (2008), Dictsiunar a limbãljei armãneascã, Editsii Timpurarã (after T. Papahagi, Ș. Mihăileanu and I. Dalametra; online at dixionline.net), p. 18
11. ^ Candrea, I.-A.; Adamescu, Gh. (1926–1931), Dicționarul enciclopedic ilustrat „Cartea Românească”, București: Cartea Românească, p. s.v. adia