anchetă

Forms

anchetă f (plural anchete)^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from French enquête, as every dictionary agrees.^{[2][3][4][5][1]} DELR traces the French word to Old French enqueste, the feminine past participle used as a noun of enquerre (“to inquire”) (modern French enquérir), from Late Latin inquaerere, a remaking of the classical Latin inquīrō (“to search into”) after the simple verb quaerō (“to ask, seek”).^[3] Graur groups it with the Romanian descendants and loans from the family of Latin quaerō, beside cere, chestie and chetă.^[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

Tiktin's first record is from 1832, with the sense “official investigation”.^[7] DELR's first record is Pontbriant's dictionary of 1862, and MDA2's Titu Maiorescu's parliamentary speeches, from 1866 on.^[3][4]

Semantic evolution

The first sense is an inquiry ordered or made by a public authority to establish the facts and the responsibility; the Academy dictionary already records a parliamentary inquiry, anchetă parlamentară.^[8][3] From it came the sense of a field survey made for science, as in anchetă dialectală, a collection of dialect material, and by extension the press genre that presents such a survey.^[4][5][9] The verb ancheta is a separate borrowing from French enquêter, recorded from 1884, and anchetator “investigator” was formed from it in Romanian, by 1910.^[3][2]

Timeline

• 1832 – the first record, after Tiktin.^[7]
• 1862 – in Pontbriant's dictionary.^[3]
• 1866 – in Titu Maiorescu's parliamentary speeches.^[4]
• 1884 – the verb ancheta, in Kogălniceanu.^[3]
• 1910 – anchetator “investigator”, in Dobrogeanu-Gherea.^[3]
• 1925 – contraanchetă “counter-inquiry”, from French contre-enquête, in Vinea.^[3]

Meanings

Noun

1. An inquiry or investigation ordered or carried out by a state body to gather evidence about an unlawful act and establish who is responsible.^[5][4]
2. A survey of social, linguistic or other facts made with questionnaires; by extension, a press article presenting the results of such a survey.^[5][9]

Word family

• ancheta
• anchetator
• contraanchetă
• microanchetă

Related words

• chestiune
• French enquête

Usage notes

The word is common in set phrases: anchetă judiciară “judicial inquiry”, anchetă parlamentară “parliamentary inquiry”, anchetă dialectală “dialect survey”.^[8][4][10]

References

1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b 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. anchetă
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i 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. anchetă
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, 62
5. ^ a b c d DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 41
6. ^ Graur, Alexandru (1980), Cuvinte înrudite, București: Editura Științifică și Enciclopedică
7. ^ a b Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. anchetă
8. ^ 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. anchetă
9. ^ a b Marcu, Florin (2000), Marele dicționar de neologisme, București: Saeculum Vizual, p. s.v. anchetă
10. ^ Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2002), Noul dicționar explicativ al limbii române, București: Litera Internațional, p. s.v. anchetă