altminteri

Forms

altminteri (adverb); variants altminterea, almintere, altmintrele, altmintrelea, almintrele.^[2][3] Neacșu's letter of 1521 has the old form aiminterea: „Împăratul au ieșit den Sofiia și aiminterea nu e” “the Emperor has left Sofia, and it is not otherwise”.^[4]

Etymology

The basic form is ⟨aimintre⟩, inherited from Latin aliā mente (“in another way”), the ablative of mēns (“mind”) used as in the adverbs of the other Romance languages.^[5][6] Ciorănescu and the DA note that it is the only Romanian adverb formed with ⟨mente⟩.^[6][7] Tiktin, Pușcariu, Candrea and DEX give alterā mente instead, and Ciorănescu combines the two.^[5][4][2][6]

The ⟨-r-⟩ of ⟨-mintre⟩ is unexplained.^[5][6] The DA suggests the influence of aliter (“otherwise”), and Pușcariu the ending of libet, used in indefinite pronouns and adverbs.^[5] The forms with ⟨alt-⟩ were remade after alt and appear only at the end of the 18th century.^[5][7] For this reason the DA rejects any link with Italian altrimenti or French autrement.^[7]

The word has cognates south of the Danube: Aromanian aljumtrea and Megleno-Romanian l'umintrea.^[5][8] Their ⟨-u-⟩ probably comes from the word for “elsewhere”, al'urea, which in Aromanian also moved the stress.^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

Neacșu's letter of 1521 has aiminterea “otherwise”.^[4] The form aimintre is first recorded in the Codex Bratul of 1559–1560.^[5]

Semantic evolution

The old texts write aim- and am-, and the am- forms, still unexplained, are even more frequent there than aimintre.^[4][7] Endings with adverbial -a and -le gave aimintrea, aimintrile and aimintrilea.^[5] The alt- forms are a learned innovation and never became colloquial.^[4] Besides “in another way”, the adverb means “or else” and “in other respects, besides”.^[2][4]

Timeline

• 1521 – aiminterea in Neacșu's letter.^[4]
• 1559–1560 – aimintre in the Codex Bratul.^[5]
• 1592–1604 – aimintrilea.^[5]
• c. 1650 – aimintrile in the Anonymus Caransebesiensis.^[5]
• 1785 – altmintere, the first form with alt-.^[5]

Meanings

Adverb

1. otherwise, in another way, differently.^[2][9]
2. If not, or else: Grăbește-te, altminteri pierzi trenul.^[2]
3. Besides, in other respects (also de altminteri).^[2][4]

Word family

• aimintrea
• aimintrilea

Related words

• alt

References

1. ^ 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. 1, 31
3. ^ Macrea, Dimitrie; Petrovici, Emil (coord.) (1955–1957), Dicționarul limbii romîne literare contemporane, 4 vols., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 1, 67
4. ^ a b c d e f g h Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. altminteri
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m 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. altminteri
6. ^ a b c d 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. altminteri
7. ^ 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. altminteri
8. ^ Cunia, Tiberius (2008), Dictsiunar a limbãljei armãneascã, Editsii Timpurarã (after T. Papahagi, Ș. Mihăileanu and I. Dalametra; online at dixionline.net), p. 48
9. ^ Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 1, 46