braț

Forms

braț n (plural brațe)^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin brachium (“arm”), a word of every Romance language.^{[2][3][4][5][1]} The Latin word is from Ancient Greek βραχίων (brakhíōn), first the part of the arm between shoulder and elbow, probably from βραχύς (brakhús, “short”), because that part is shorter than the rest of the limb.^[2][1]

The word survives in all four branches: Aromanian brats, Megleno-Romanian braț and Istro-Romanian bråț.^[2][3][6][7] Its Romance cognates include Italian braccio, French bras, Occitan bratz, Catalan bras, Spanish brazo and Portuguese braço.^[3][5]

Earliest recorded meaning

DELR dates the first record to about 1500, in the Psaltirea Hurmuzaki.^[2] The forms brațul and brațele occur there in several psalms, and braț itself in Coresi's psalter of 1570.^[8] Tiktin's first record is the Psaltirea Scheiană, also at Psalm 135:12.^[9]

Semantic evolution

From the arm itself the word came to mean what the arms can hold, un braț de vreascuri “an armful of brushwood”, and anything shaped like an arm: the arm of a river or of the sea, an armrest, the handles of tools such as tongs, harrows and saws.^[9][3] The psalms already use the arm as a sign of power, and Scriban records brațul lui Dumnezeu “the arm of God” and the sense “labour”, as in a trăi din brațele sale “to live by one's hands”.^[10] Tiktin notes that some recent phrases were reinforced by French bras: a da, a oferi brațul cuiva “to give someone one's arm” and brațul drept al cuiva “someone's right hand”.^[9] DELR adds brațe de muncă “workers” and the arms of cephalopods.^[2]

Several derivatives were made in Romanian or modelled on other languages: antebraț “forearm” in 1843 after French avant-bras, brațetă in a merge la brațetă “to walk arm in arm” in 1828 from Italian a braccetto, and subraț “armpit” in 1929 after sous-bras.^[2] îmbrățișa “to embrace” comes from the adverb brățiș “body to body”.^[3][2] brățară “bracelet”, recorded in the same psalter as braț, has its own Latin source, Latin brachiāle.^[2]

Timeline

• c. 1500 – first record, in the Psaltirea Hurmuzaki.^[2]
• 1570 – braț in Coresi's psalter.^[8]
• 1649 – brațe in Mardarie's Slavonic–Romanian lexicon, glossing a Slavonic word for bosom.^[11]
• 1682–1686 – braț in Dosoftei's lives of the saints.^[12]
• 1688 – the old plural brațuri in the Bucharest Bible.^[9]
• 1828 – brațetă in a merge la brațetă “to walk arm in arm”.^[2]
• 1843 – antebraț “forearm”.^[2]
• 1907 – brață “armful”.^[2]
• 1929 – subraț “armpit”.^[2]
• 1957 – the nautical term braț “brace” in the technical lexicon.^[12]

Meanings

Noun

1. The upper arm, between elbow and shoulder; the arm from the shoulder to the wrist; by extension the whole upper limb.^[13][12][2]
2. An armful: un braț de lemne “an armful of firewood”.^[13][2]
3. (figurative) In brațe de muncă: workers, the labour force.^[13][2]
4. A part of an object that looks or works like an arm: the arm of a balance or crane, an armrest, the handle of a tool, a lever arm.^[13][2][9]
5. A branch of a river; a narrow arm of the sea.^[3][9][10]
6. An arm of a cephalopod or similar water animal.^[2]

Word family

• antebraț
• brațetă
• brățiș
• brățișor
• brățoi
• îmbrățișa
• îmbrățoșa
• subraț

Related words

• brățară
• Aromanian brats
• Latin brachium

Usage notes

Common phrases: braț la braț or la braț “arm in arm”, a primi cu brațele deschise “to welcome with open arms”, a sta cu brațele încrucișate “to sit idle” and a fi brațul drept al cuiva “to be someone's right hand”.^[13][10] Pe brațe! was said when someone sneezed.^[9] The plural is brațe; older texts also have brață and brațuri.^[12][9] A nautical braț “brace”, the line used to swing a yard, is a separate word, borrowed from English brace and French bras.^[12][14]

References

1. ^ a b c d 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 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. braț
3. ^ 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. braț
4. ^ Pușcariu, Sextil (1905), Etymologisches Wörterbuch der rumänischen Sprache I: Lateinisches Element, Heidelberg: Carl Winter, p. 18
5. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 1256
6. ^ Capidan, Theodor (1935), Meglenoromânii III: Dicționar meglenoromân, București: Academia Română, p. 44
7. ^ Saramandu, Nicolae (coord.) et al. (2010–), Dicționarul dialectului meglenoromân, general și etimologic, fascicles in Fonetică și dialectologie XXIX–, p. 92
8. ^ a b Gînsac, Ana-Maria; Ungureanu, Mădălina; Moruz, Alexandru et al., roPsalt: Re-evaluating the Sixteenth Century Romanian Psalters (aligned corpus), Iași: Universitatea „Alexandru Ioan Cuza”, https://scriptadacoromanica.ro, p. Ps 135:12
9. ^ 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. braț
10. ^ a b c Scriban, August (1939), Dicționaru limbii românești (etimologii, înțelesuri, exemple, citațiuni, arhaizme, neologizme, provincializme), Iași: Presa Bună, p. 193
11. ^ Ungureanu, Mădălina; Gînsac, Ana-Maria; Moruz, Alexandru (eds.), eRomLex: The First Romanian Bilingual Dictionaries (17th century), Iași: Universitatea „Alexandru Ioan Cuza”, https://scriptadacoromanica.ro, p. s.v. brațe
12. ^ 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, 241
13. ^ a b c d e DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 116
14. ^ Marcu, Florin; Maneca, Constant (1986), Dicționar de neologisme, 3rd ed., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Socialiste România, p. s.v. braț