alertă

Forms

alertă f (plural alerte)^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from French alerte (“alarm”).^{[2][3][4][5][6]} Marcu & Maneca also compare Italian all'erta (“on the height”).^[7]

The French word comes from the phrase à l’erte (“on guard”), from the Italian phrase, properly “on a height”, a military expression for a lookout on raised ground.^[4] The French borrowed it in the 16th century, written a l’herte by Rabelais and a l’airte by Montaigne; it was first an interjection, and the feminine noun “alarm” dates from the second half of the 18th century.^[8] Italian erta (“steep slope”) is the feminine of erto (“steep, raised”), the past participle of ergere (“to raise”), from Latin ērigō (“to raise”), from ex- and regō (“to direct”).^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

DELR dates the noun to 1940, in Argetoianu, with the sense “alarm”.^[4] MDA2 gives only the second edition of DEX (1998) as its record.^[3]

Semantic evolution

The word means “alarm”, often figuratively.^[2] A specialised sense is the conventional international signal that warns scientists of a celestial event whose course and geophysical effects must be followed.^[2][3] The adjective alert “lively, prompt” and the verb alerta had been borrowed from French earlier, in 1862 and 1892.^[4]

Timeline

• 1940 – the first record, “alarm”, in Argetoianu.^[4]
• 1998 – in the second edition of DEX, MDA2's record.^[3]

Meanings

Noun

1. An alert, an alarm; alarmă; often figurative.^[2][3][1]
2. An international conventional signal that draws scientists' attention to a celestial phenomenon whose course and effects must be watched.^[2][3]

Related words

• alert
• alerta
• alertețe
• alarmă

Usage notes

The noun has the plural alerte.^[2] The adjective alert “lively, quick” and the verb alerta “to warn of a danger” are separate borrowings from French alerte and alerter.^[4]

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 28
3. ^ 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, 40
4. ^ a b c d e f g 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. alertă
5. ^ Costăchescu, Adriana; Dincă, Daniela; Dragoste, Ramona; Popescu, Mihaela; Scurtu, Gabriela (2009–2010), Dicționar de împrumuturi lexicale din limba franceză (DILF), 2 vols., Craiova: Universitaria, p. s.v. alertă
6. ^ Marcu, Florin (2000), Marele dicționar de neologisme, București: Saeculum Vizual
7. ^ Marcu, Florin; Maneca, Constant (1986), Dicționar de neologisme, 3rd ed., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Socialiste România
8. ^ Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert