castel

Forms

castel n (plural castele)^[1]

Etymology

It is learned borrowed from Latin castellum (“fort, castle”), with borrowed from Italian castello as a second model, as DELR gives it.^[2] Ciorănescu, MDA2 and DEX give the Latin word, which Ciorănescu dates to the 17th century, and MDA2 and DEX compare the Polish and Italian words.^[3][4][5][1] The DA thought the word came in early by several routes, from Latin, Polish, German Kastell and Italian.^[6] Gabinschi too allowed German mediation.^[7]

The old variants coștei and caștei are borrowed from Hungarian kastély, and caștel is borrowed from Polish kasztel.^[2][3] The Hungarian word, recorded from 1263, is a loan from northern Italian according to the ÚESz and Zaicz, while the TESz derives it from German.^[8][9][10] The Latin word is the diminutive of castrum (“fort”).^[11][1][12] It has descendants in all the western Romance languages, such as French château, Catalan castell, Spanish castillo and Portuguese castelo.^[13]

Earliest recorded meaning

DELR's first record is the variant coștei, about 1650, and the derivative castelan is even earlier, about 1640.^[2] Tiktin dates castel itself to about 1690, in a passage of the Moldavian chronicles which says that the oldest and smallest fortresses had been „ca niște castele adecă turnuri” “like castles, that is towers”.^[14][6]

Semantic evolution

The first sense was a fortified building, a fort or small citadel; a translation of Varlaam și Ioasaf of 1764 has a king sending orders to all his cities and casteluri.^[6] Negulici's dictionary of 1848 glosses it with cetățuie “citadel” and “a big house or fortified palace of a great man”.^[15] In the 19th century it took on the Western sense of a lord's residence: Bolintineanu's „vechiu castel” and Eminescu's „Stă castelul singuratic, oglindindu-se în lacuri” “the castle stands alone, mirrored in the lakes”, then a royal or princely country house such as Peleș.^[6][16]

Castele în Spania “castles in Spain” are idle dreams, as in Vlahuță's „nu-mi fac deloc castele în Spania”.^[14][5] Castel de apă is a water tower, and on ships the word names the superstructures above the upper deck.^[5][4] The old plural was casteluri.^[6][17]

Timeline

• c. 1640 – castelan “owner of a castle”.^[2]
• c. 1650 – the variant coștei, the first record of the word.^[2]
• c. 1690 – castele in the Moldavian chronicles.^[14]
• 1715 – castelachi, a diminutive from Modern Greek καστελλάκι (kastellaki).^[2]
• 1764 – the plural casteluri in Varlaam și Ioasaf.^[6]
• 1841 – castelană “lady of a castle”.^[2]
• 1848 – in Negulici's dictionary of neologisms.^[15]

Meanings

Noun

1. A large medieval castle with towers and battlements, surrounded by walls and moats, the residence of a feudal lord; today also a large house built in medieval style.^[5][1]
2. castel de apă: a water tower.^[5]
3. Each of the structures above the upper deck of a ship; a forecastle or sterncastle.^[5][4]

Word family

• castelan
• vicecastelan

Related words

• castru
• cetate

Usage notes

A-și face castele în Spania means to build castles in the air, to dream of the impossible.^[18][5]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ 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. castel
3. ^ 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. castel
4. ^ a b c Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 1, 306
5. ^ a b c d e f g DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 150
6. ^ 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. castel
7. ^ Gabinschi, Marcu (2001), Dicționar de dublete etimologice ale limbii române, 2nd ed., Chișinău: Litera, p. 75
8. ^ Gerstner, Károly (ed.) (2006–), Új magyar etimológiai szótár, Budapest: Nyelvtudományi Kutatóközpont; online at uesz.nytud.hu
9. ^ Zaicz, Gábor (ed.) (2006), Etimológiai szótár: magyar szavak és toldalékok eredete, Budapest: Tinta Könyvkiadó
10. ^ Benkő, Loránd (ed.) (1967–1976), A magyar nyelv történeti-etimológiai szótára, 3 vols., Budapest: Akadémiai Kiadó, p. 2, 399
11. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
12. ^ Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
13. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 1745
14. ^ a b c Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. castel
15. ^ a b Negulici, I. D. (1848), Vocabular romînesc de toate vorbele streine întroduse pînă acum în limba romînească și de toate cuvintele ce s-ar mai putea introduce încă, București, p. 74
16. ^ Șăineanu, Lazăr (1929), Dicționar universal al limbei române, 6th ed., Craiova: Scrisul Românesc, p. 1, 110
17. ^ Barcianu, Sava Popovici (1886), Dicționar român-germân și germân-român, revised by D. P. Barcianu, part I: român-germân, Sibiu: Institut tipografic, p. 90
18. ^ Candrea, I.-A.; Adamescu, Gh. (1926–1931), Dicționarul enciclopedic ilustrat „Cartea Românească”, București: Cartea Românească, p. s.v. castel