bocet

Forms

bocet n (plural bocete)^[1] The old form was boacet, plural boacete, rarely boaceturi.^[2][3][4] Dosoftei's Paremiar has boacetă: „Întoarceți-vă spre mine din toată inema voastră, cu post și plâns și cu boacetă” “turn to me with all your heart, with fasting and weeping and lamentation”.^[4]

Etymology

It is formed from Romanian boci + -et, like plânset from plânge and râset from râde.^[5][2][4][6] Giuglea proposed instead Vulgar Latin *vōcitum, which Ciorănescu finds unnecessary.^[6][1] The verb goes back through boace “voice” to Latin vōx (“voice”).^[3]

It has a counterpart in Aromanian boatsit.^[3][7] Șăineanu compared Corsican voceru “funeral lament”, a derivative of the same Latin word.^[8][9]

Earliest recorded meaning

Tiktin dates the first record to 1642, in the Cazanie printed at Govora.^[4] DELR's first record is boacet in the Moldavian law code of 1646.^[3][2]

Semantic evolution

The word first meant any loud weeping or lament.^[4][2] It came to name above all the ritual lament sung at village funerals, improvised verses chanted to a set tune by the relatives of the dead or by hired mourners, the bocitoare.^[4][10][2] As a genre of folk poetry it has fixed themes;^[5] Tiktin names the first collections of such laments, by Burada and by Marian.^[5][4]

Timeline

• 1642 – first record, in the Govora Cazanie.^[4]
• 1646 – boacet in the Moldavian law code.^[3]

Meanings

Noun

1. Loud, tormented weeping with wails and cries; jalet, vaiet.^[5][1]
2. A ritual lament sung at a funeral; a genre of folk poetry, the cântare de mort.^[5][2][1]

Related words

• boci
• boace
• Aromanian boatsit

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ 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, 222
3. ^ a b c d e 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. boace
4. ^ a b c d e f g h Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. bocet
5. ^ a b c d e DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 110
6. ^ 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. boci
7. ^ Cunia, Tiberius (2008), Dictsiunar a limbãljei armãneascã, Editsii Timpurarã (after T. Papahagi, Ș. Mihăileanu and I. Dalametra; online at dixionline.net), p. 203
8. ^ Șăineanu, Lazăr (1929), Dicționar universal al limbei române, 6th ed., Craiova: Scrisul Românesc, p. 1, 69
9. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 9459
10. ^ Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan” (1998), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române, 2nd ed., București: Univers Enciclopedic, p. 104