atașa

Forms

atașa (third-person singular present atașează, past participle atașat), 1st conjugation.^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from French attacher (“to attach, tie”), a 19th-century borrowing that the DA still labelled a Gallicism.^{[2][3][4][5][1]} The French verb is the Old French estachier (“to attach, fasten (to a stake)”) with its initial replaced by the prefix a-; the older verb is formed on estache (“stake, post”), from Frankish *stakka.^[3][6] The DHLF calls the French word not entirely clear: a derivative of Latin attingō (“to touch”) has also been proposed, but the change of prefix is the solution most often accepted, with the difficulty that the Germanic words compared have a single /k/.^[6]

Romanian took several members of the French family separately: atașament from attachement, atașat (a junior diplomat) from attaché, ataș (a sidecar) from attache and atașant from attachant.^[3] Ciorănescu compares detașa.^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

DELR dates the first record to 1844, in C. A. Rosetti, with the senses “to join one object to another by a fastening” and “to become fond of someone”.^[3] Tiktin's first date is 1853, for attaching someone to an embassy.^[7] The noun atașament “attachment, affection” is recorded two years before the verb, in 1842 in Alecsandri.^[3]

Semantic evolution

The physical sense, joining one thing to another, and the reflexive figurative sense, becoming attached to someone, both came from French and are both given by the DA in 1913.^[5][2] The DA explains the literal meaning of the French verb as tying something with a string, rope or chain.^[5] An administrative use, assigning a person or a department to another one (attaching an official to an embassy, a corporal to a company as instructor), runs from Tiktin's first record through the DLRLC's quotations from Sadoveanu.^[7][8] MDA2 adds the reflexive sense “to fall in love”.^[9]

The noun atașament took the computing sense “file attached to an e-mail” after English attachment.^[3]

Timeline

• 1842 – the noun atașament “attachment, affection” in Alecsandri.^[3]
• 1844 – the verb in C. A. Rosetti, the first record.^[3]
• 1851 – atașat “junior diplomat, attaché” in Alecsandri.^[3]
• 1853 – “to attach someone to an embassy”.^[7]
• 1913 – the DA gives the transitive and the reflexive senses, marked as a Gallicism.^[5]
• 1934 – atașabil “attachable” and atașant “captivating”.^[3]
• 1935 – ataș “sidecar” in Vissarion.^[3]
• 1988 – neatașabil “not attachable; unsociable”.^[3]

Meanings

Verb

1. (transitive and reflexive) To attach, to join (often temporarily) to something or someone: Am atașat factura la dosar.^[2][8]
2. (transitive) To assign a person to a service, a unit or an embassy.^[10][7]
3. (reflexive, figurative) To become fond of someone or something, to grow attached.^[2][9]

Word family

• ataș
• atașabil
• atașament
• atașat
• neatașabil

Related words

• detașa
• French attacher

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 71
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. atașa
4. ^ 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. atașa
5. ^ 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. atașa
6. ^ a b Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
7. ^ 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. atașa
8. ^ a b Macrea, Dimitrie; Petrovici, Emil (coord.) (1955–1957), Dicționarul limbii romîne literare contemporane, 4 vols., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 1, 156
9. ^ a b Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 1, 120
10. ^ Candrea, I.-A.; Adamescu, Gh. (1926–1931), Dicționarul enciclopedic ilustrat „Cartea Românească”, București: Cartea Românească, p. s.v. atașa