apăra

Forms

apăra (third-person singular present apără, past participle apărat, third-person subjunctive apere) 1st conjugation^[1] A rare old variant păra is either a shortening of apăra or comes from Latin parāre (Drăganu).^[2]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin apparō (“to prepare, make ready”), formed on parō (“to prepare”).^{[3][2][4][1][5]}

It survives south of the Danube as Aromanian apăr and Istro-Romanian opăr;^[3][2][6] DELR gives the Istro-Romanian form as aparå.^[3][2][6] The Romance cognates Italian apparare, Occitan aparar, Spanish aparar and Portuguese aparar keep the sense “to prepare”.^[7][1][3]

The meaning moved from “to make ready against” to “to stop, ward off” and then to “to protect”.^[2][3] The middle sense is found only in Romanian for this verb, but the simple verb has it elsewhere: Italian parare, Catalan parar and Portuguese parar, and French parer “to parry”.^[2][8] Ciorănescu compares French défendre, which means both “to defend” and “to forbid”.^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

DELR dates the first record to the Psaltirea Hurmuzaki of the early 16th century.^[2] MDA2 dates it to the Codicele Voronețean, which has in Acts 27:43 „Și apără sveatul lor” “and he stopped their plan”.^[4][8]

Semantic evolution

In the old language the verb meant “to stop, prevent, forbid” and, reflexively, “to refuse, hold back”: Dosoftei writes „Apere D-dzău să fug eu de cununa mărturiei!” “God forbid that I should flee the martyr's crown!”.^[8][2] The sense “to defend, protect” grew from it and became the main one, with the legal “to defend (in court)” beside it.^[2][9] Aromanian keeps the old blessing s-apără Dumnidzău “may God protect”, which Papahagi compares with Greek and Albanian formulas.^[6]

Shepherds still use it for turning animals back from a wrong path.^[2][4] The participle gave neapărat, first “unstoppable, indispensable”, now “necessarily”, and the Transylvanian noun apărat “forbidden pasture or wood” (1887) keeps the sense “to forbid”.^[2]

Timeline

• early 16th century – first record, in the Psaltirea Hurmuzaki; neapărat in the same text.^[2]
• 16th century – „apără sveatul lor” in the Codicele Voronețean.^[4][8]
• 1570 – apărător and the noun apărat in Coresi's Psalter.^[2]
• 1581 – apărătură “obstacle, fortification” in Coresi's Carte de învățătură.^[2]
• 1611 – apărământ “protection”.^[2]
• 1933 – autoapărare “self-defence”, after French autodéfense.^[2]

Meanings

Verb

1. To defend: to come to the help of someone or something against an attack; to hold a place by fighting;^[9][1] (reflexive) to defend oneself.^[9][1]
2. To protect, shelter from danger, cold and the like.^[9][4]
3. To support a person or idea against objections; to plead someone's case in court;^[9][2] (reflexive) to defend oneself against a charge.^[9][2]
4. (dated) To stop, prevent, forbid.^[2][3]

Word family

• apărat
• apărătură
• autoapărare
• neapărat
• apărare
• apărătoare
• apărător

Related words

• Aromanian apăr
• Latin apparō

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 l m n o p q r s 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. apăra
3. ^ 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. apăra
4. ^ a b c d e Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 1, 78
5. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 534
6. ^ a b c Papahagi, Tache (1963), Dicționarul dialectului aromân, general și etimologic, București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 116
7. ^ 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. apăra
8. ^ 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. apăra
9. ^ a b c d e f DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 53