amar

Forms

amar m or n (feminine singular amară, masculine plural amari, feminine/neuter plural amare)^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin amārus (“bitter”).^[2][3][4][1] The word survives in all four branches: Aromanian amar, Megleno-Romanian (an)mar and Istro-Romanian amår.^[2][3][5] Its Romance cognates include Dalmatian amuár, Italian amaro, Old Occitan amar, French amer and Spanish amargo.^[2][6]

De Vaan reconstructs the Latin adjective as Proto-Indo-European *h₂h₃m-ro- with a question mark, comparing Sanskrit and Germanic words for “sour”, and judges the further links uncertain.^[7] Wiktionary traces it to *h₂eh₃- (“to be hot”).^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is a place name, Amarul, in a document of 1430.^[3][8] In Romanian texts MDA2 dates the adjective to the Codicele Voronețean (c. 1563–1583), and Coresi's psalter of 1570 has it twice.^[4][9] The derivative amărăciune “bitterness” is older still in writing, in the Psaltirea Hurmuzaki of the early 16th century.^[3]

Semantic evolution

The literal sense is the taste of gall, wormwood or quinine, and it was soon used figuratively of pain and grief: Tiktin quotes plângând cu lacrimi amare “weeping bitter tears”.^[2][8][10] As a noun the word means sorrow or suffering, and old texts used amar! as a cry of woe: in a 17th-century homily the damned hear nothing but „amar! amar!”.^[8][10] The exclamation amar de mine “woe is me” has close parallels in Sicilian amaru mia and Portuguese amaro de mi.^[2][6]

After words of quantity such as atâta or ce, the noun means “a great deal”, as in amar de vreme “a long time”.^[2][10] Ciorănescu found this sense curious.^[2] Morărescu explained it by folk etymology, from a phrase atâta *mare de (timp) reread as atâta amar de (timp), and Leo Spitzer argued against him.^[2] Ciorănescu himself takes it as an emphatic use of the adjective treated as a noun, with pity as its first value and quantity only second.^[2]

Romanian built a large family on the word: the verb amărî, recorded as amărí in the Psaltirea Scheiană, which Pușcariu and the REW derive from a Latin *amārīre and others form in Romanian.^[3] The adjective amărăcios is traced by Pușcariu and the REW to a Latin *amaritiosus, while Ciorănescu prefers a Romanian derivative with the suffix -cios.^[2][3]

Timeline

• 1430 – the place name Amarul, the first record.^[3][8]
• c. 1500-1520 – amărăciune “bitterness” in the Psaltirea Hurmuzaki.^[3]
• c. 1563-1583 – amar in the Codicele Voronețean.^[4]
• 1570 – amar in Coresi's psalter.^[9]
• c. 1573-1578 – the verb amărí in the Psaltirea Scheiană.^[3]
• 1620 – amarnic “cruel, terrible”, as márnic, in Moxa's chronicle.^[3]
• 1691-1697 – amărăcios in Teodor Corbea's dictionary.^[3]
• 1784 – amăreală “bitter taste”.^[3]

Meanings

Adjective

1. bitter: having the taste of gall, wormwood or quinine.^[10][1]
2. (figurative) painful, grievous, sad: zile amare “hard days”.^[10][4]
3. (adverbial) terribly, bitterly: a plânge amar “to weep bitterly”.^[10][8]
4. (figurative) spiteful, ill-natured.^[10][4]

Noun

1. sorrow, grief, suffering.^[10]
2. (as an interjection) woe!^[10][8]
3. (followed by de) a great quantity: amar de vreme “ages”.^[10][2]

Word family

• amarnic
• amărăcios
• amărăciune
• amărăluță
• amărea
• amăreală
• amărel
• amăriu
• amărî
• amărui
• amăruță

Related words

• amărât
• Aromanian amar
• Latin amārus

Usage notes

Common phrases are a-și vărsa amarul “to pour out one's sorrows” and a-și înghiți amarul “to suffer in silence”.^[10] Pâine amară “bitter bread” is a living earned with great hardship.^[10][4]

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 k 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. amar
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l 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. amar
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, 49
5. ^ Papahagi, Tache (1963), Dicționarul dialectului aromân, general și etimologic, București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 88
6. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 406
7. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
8. ^ a b c d e f Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. amar
9. ^ a b 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 9:29
10. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 33