arbore

Forms

arbore m (plural arbori)^[1] The old texts have arbure, the regular form: the New Testament of 1648 has „Arburi veșteziți fără rod” “withered trees without fruit” (Jude 1:12).^[2][3] Arbor is the Latinist form of the 19th century: Eminescu writes „Ca și iedera de-un arbor, de-o idee i se leagă” “like ivy to a tree, he is bound to one idea”.^[3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin arbor (“tree”), accusative arborem.^{[4][5][6][2][7][1]} The regular outcome was arbure, the form of the old texts; the modern form took its stressed /o/ from Latin and its neologisms.^[5][1] The Academy dictionary describes how the Latinist writers of the 19th century brought back the archaism and introduced the neologism ⟨arbor⟩, which merged into the modern form.^[3] The Latin noun was feminine, but Romanian made it masculine, as most Romance languages did, a gender already found in a Latin inscription from Lyon.^[3][8] The senses “mast” and “shaft of a machine” follow French usage.^[4][2]

The word survives in all four branches: Aromanian arbure, Megleno-Romanian arbur and Istro-Romanian årbure.^{[5][4][9][10]} Its Romance cognates include Italian albero, French arbre, Catalan arbre, Spanish árbol and Portuguese árvore.^[5][7] Ciorănescu also compares Albanian arbur.^[5][7] De Vaan connects the Latin word with arduus (“high”) and derives it from Proto-Indo-European *h₃r̥dʰōs (“height, uprightness”), though he notes that such a formation would be very archaic.^[11][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is the personal name Arbure in a Moldavian document of 1471.^[4][2] As a common noun DELR first finds it in 1551–1553, as arbure in the Slavonic–Romanian Gospel.^[4] MDA2 gives a 16th-century text quoted by Hasdeu, which the Academy dictionary prints as „Mearseră cătră un arbure și închiră-se pără la pământu” “they went to a tree and it bowed down to the ground”.^[6][3] The sense was “tree”.^[4]

Semantic evolution

Tiktin finds arbure often in the 16th and 17th centuries; it then gave way to copac and lemn and was revived by the Latinists in the form arbor(e).^[2] In speech the Academy dictionary found it replaced by pom, copac and locally lemn: in the Banat the people called trees lemne.^[3]

The 19th century added senses after French: a ship's mast (arborul mare “the mainmast”), and later the shaft that carries the rotation of a machine.^[2][4][12] Arbore genealogic “family tree” and the plant names arbore-de-cacao, arbore-de-cafea and arborele vieții “thuja” are modern compounds.^[13][12] Computing gave it the sense of a tree graph.^[14]

Most of its family consists of neologisms: arbora “to hoist (a flag)” came from French arborer in 1830, arborescent from French in 1859.^[4] arboret “grove” (1822) may be Latin arborētum or a Romanian derivative.^[4] Ciorănescu notes that it matches Aromanian arburet.^[4][5][15]

Timeline

• 1471 – the personal name Arbure, the first record.^[4][2]
• 1551–1553 – arbure as a common noun in the Slavonic–Romanian Gospel.^[4]
• 16th century – „cătră un arbure” in a text quoted by Hasdeu.^[6][3]
• 1648 – arburi “trees” in the New Testament.^[2]
• 1822 – arboret “grove”.^[4]
• 1830 – arbora “to hoist”, from French.^[4]
• 1848 – the diminutive arborel.^[4]
• 1859 – arborescent “tree-like”.^[4]

Meanings

Noun

1. A tree: a woody plant with a tall, strong trunk and branches whose leaves form a crown; copac, pom.^[13][6][1]
2. (mechanics) A shaft: the part of a machine that receives and passes on a rotation.^[13][4]
3. (nautical) A mast of a ship.^[2][16]
4. Arbore genealogic: a family tree, a drawing of the branches and degrees of kinship of a family.^[13][6]
5. (computing) A tree graph: a directed graph without cycles.^[14]

Word family

• arboraș
• arborescent
• arborescență
• arboret
• arborel

Related words

• Aromanian arbure
• Latin arbor

Usage notes

The compounds arbore-de-cacao, arbore-de-cafea, arbore-de-cauciuc and arbore-de-pâine name tropical trees.^[13] The compound arborele vieții is the thuja, and figuratively a diagram of a person's life.^[13][6] In everyday speech copac is the usual word.^[3]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. arbore
3. ^ a b c d e f g h 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. arbore
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q 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. arbore
5. ^ a b c d e f 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. arbore
6. ^ 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, 89
7. ^ a b c Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 606
8. ^ Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
9. ^ Pascu, Giorge (1925), Dictionnaire étymologique macédoroumain, 2 vols. (I: Les éléments latins et romans; II: Les éléments grecs, turcs, slaves, albanais, germaniques, magyars, néologismes, créations immédiates, obscurs), Iași: Cultura Națională, p. 1, 38
10. ^ Capidan, Theodor (1935), Meglenoromânii III: Dicționar meglenoromân, București: Academia Română, p. 26
11. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
12. ^ a b Scriban, August (1939), Dicționaru limbii românești (etimologii, înțelesuri, exemple, citațiuni, arhaizme, neologizme, provincializme), Iași: Presa Bună, p. 117
13. ^ a b c d e f DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 58
14. ^ a b Marcu, Florin (2000), Marele dicționar de neologisme, București: Saeculum Vizual, p. s.v. arbore
15. ^ Papahagi, Tache (1963), Dicționarul dialectului aromân, general și etimologic, București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 136
16. ^ Marcu, Florin; Maneca, Constant (1986), Dicționar de neologisme, 3rd ed., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Socialiste România, p. s.v. arbore