cantitate

Forms

cantitate f (plural cantități)^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from French quantité and directly borrowed from Latin quantitas, one of the neologisms with two models that Romanian dictionaries name together.^[2][3][4][5] DELR takes the standard form from French and the older variants cuantitate and cvantitate from the Latin word, borrowed as a learned neologism.^[6] The DA also calls it a neologism modelled on French.^[7]

The Latin noun is formed from quantus (“how great, how much”) with the suffix -tās.^[6][1] Cicero coined it as a calque of Ancient Greek ποσότης (posótēs), on the model of quālitās (“quality”), which gave Romanian calitate.^[6][1] French took the word from Latin in the 12th century, first in the form quantiteit.^[8]

Earliest recorded meaning

Tiktin dates the first record to 1818.^[5] DELR's first record is of 1825, in the Latinizing variant cvantitate, and the sense is that of a property expressed by a number obtained by measuring or counting.^[6] MDA2's first record is later, Ion Ionescu's book on the agriculture of Putna county of 1869, which the DA quotes for the everyday sense of a large number: „Din păduri se scot haraci în cantități considerabile” “vine props are taken out of the forests in considerable quantities”.^[3][7]

Semantic evolution

The 19th-century dictionaries still spelled the word after Latin: Pontbriant in 1862 gave quantitate as its Latin form, and Costinescu in 1870 entered it as Quantitate, with câtățime and câtime as native equivalents.^[9][10] Tiktin lists cvant- and quant- as obsolete spellings.^[5]

Besides the general sense of “amount, number”, the word took on technical senses early: in mathematics anything made of homogeneous parts that can be increased, decreased, measured or counted, with cantitate pozitivă and cantitate negativă in algebra, and in metrics and grammar the length of a sound or syllable, on which Greek and Latin verse was based.^[7][11][12] The dictionaries of the 1950s add the philosophical category opposed to calitate “quality”, whose change prepares changes of quality without producing them at first.^[13][14] The adjective cantitativ is recorded from 1838, borrowed from French quantitatif.^[6] Recent press language compounds the noun as cantitate-record “record quantity”.^[15]

Timeline

• 1818 – the first record Tiktin gives.^[5]
• 1825 – the variant cvantitate.^[6]
• 1838 – the adjective cantitativ.^[6]
• 1862 – Pontbriant's dictionary gives the Latin form quantitate beside it.^[9]
• 1869 – cantități considerabile “considerable quantities” in Ion Ionescu's book on the agriculture of Putna county.^[3][7]
• 1870 – Costinescu spells it Quantitate.^[10]
• 1955–1957 – the philosophical sense in the DLRLC.^[13]

Meanings

Noun

1. An amount, number or size of something.^[2][3][1]
2. A property that can be expressed by a number obtained by measuring or counting.^[2][16]
3. (philosophy) The set of determinations that express the measurable degree of development of an object's qualities.^[2][4]
4. (mathematics) Anything made of homogeneous parts that can be increased or decreased, measured or counted;^[3][7] cantitate negativă “negative quantity”.^[3][7]
5. (phonetics, prosody) The duration of a sound or syllable: Versul latin se întemeia pe cantitatea silabelor.^[2][11]
6. (logic) A criterion for classifying judgements by the extent of the subject.^[4]

Word family

• cantitativ

Related words

• calitate
• Latin quantus

Usage notes

In colloquial use cantitate neglijabilă “negligible quantity” is said of a thing or person of little account.^[2][11] A produce în cantități industriale means “to produce in large amounts”.^[14]

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 140
3. ^ 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, 287
4. ^ a b c Marcu, Florin (2000), Marele dicționar de neologisme, București: Saeculum Vizual, p. s.v. cantitate
5. ^ 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. cantitate
6. ^ a b c d e f g 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. cantitate
7. ^ a b c d e f 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. cantitate
8. ^ Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert, p. s.v. quantité
9. ^ a b Pontbriant, Raoul de (1862), Dictiunaru romano-francesu, Bucuresci: A. Ulrich / Göttingen: Dieterich, p. 105
10. ^ a b Costinescu, Ion (1870), Vocabularu romano-francesu, 2 vols., Bucuresci, p. 2, 390
11. ^ a b c Scriban, August (1939), Dicționaru limbii românești (etimologii, înțelesuri, exemple, citațiuni, arhaizme, neologizme, provincializme), Iași: Presa Bună, p. 225
12. ^ Șăineanu, Lazăr (1929), Dicționar universal al limbei române, 6th ed., Craiova: Scrisul Românesc, p. 99
13. ^ a b Macrea, Dimitrie; Petrovici, Emil (coord.) (1955–1957), Dicționarul limbii romîne literare contemporane, 4 vols., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 1, 325
14. ^ a b Academia Republicii Populare Romîne (1958), Dicționarul limbii romîne moderne, București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 1, 112
15. ^ Dimitrescu, Florica (1997), Dicționar de cuvinte recente, 2nd ed., București: Logos (with the 3rd ed., 2013, in CLRE), p. s.v. cantitate
16. ^ Marcu, Florin; Maneca, Constant (1986), Dicționar de neologisme, 3rd ed., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Socialiste România, p. s.v. cantitate