cenușă

Forms

cenușă f (plural cenuși)^[1] The western form cenușe is still heard, and Scriban labels cenușă eastern and cenușe western.^[2] Ciorănescu treats the difference as one of spelling only.^[3] The 16th-century psalters write cenușe: „derep-ce cenușe ca pâne mâncaiu” “for I ate ashes like bread” (Psaltirea Scheiană).^[4]

Etymology

It is inherited from Vulgar Latin *cinusia, a collective formed on Latin cinus, a by-form of cinis (“ashes”) that was declined like genus.^[5][3][6][1] Ciorănescu finds the Vulgar Latin form confirmed by Corsican and by Sardinian cinus.^[3] He considers less likely the older view of Philippide, Meyer and Byhan that Romanian formed the word itself from the Latin noun with a suffix ⟨-ușe⟩.^[3] The Latin word comes from Proto-Indo-European *ken- (“dust, ashes”).^[1]

The word survives in all four branches: Aromanian cinushi, Megleno-Romanian țănușă and Istro-Romanian țerușe.^[3][7][8][9] The other Romance languages continue a parallel *cinisia: Italian cinigia, Dalmatian canaisa, Spanish ceniza and Portuguese cinza.^[5][3][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

DELR dates the first record to about 1500, in the form cenrușe.^[5] The Psaltirea Scheiană, of about 1573–1578, has cenușe in Psalm 101, where the Psaltirea Hurmuzaki has a variant reading.^[4][10][11] In both the sense is the ash left by fire, eaten like bread.^[4]

Semantic evolution

The concrete sense, the powder left after burning, has stayed the main one.^[6][11] DA contrasts cold cenușă with spuză, the hot embers still glowing in it.^[4] From the cremation of the dead came the sense “remains of a dead person”, which Scriban explains by the Roman custom of burning bodies.^[2][6] A set of homely phrases built on the hearth followed: a lua cuiva și cenușa din vatră “to take even the ashes from someone's hearth”, that is, to strip him of everything, and a trage cenușa pe turta sa “to draw the ashes onto one's own cake”, to look after one's own interest.^[10][6]

The derivatives are old.^[5] Cenușar is recorded in 1437 for a chancery scribe, and later named the man who gathered ash for soap-making and the fairy-tale hero who sits by the hearth.^[5] Cenușiu “ash-grey” is recorded from 1683, and cenușăreasă, the Cinderella of the folk tales, from 1840.^[5]

Timeline

• 1437 – the derivative cenușar, as the name of a chancery scribe.^[5]
• c. 1500 – the variant cenrușe, the first record of the word.^[5]
• c. 1573–1578 – cenușe in the Psaltirea Scheiană.^[11][10]
• 1649 – cenușă in Mardarie's Slavonic–Romanian lexicon, glossing Slavonic пепелъ “ash”.^[12]
• 1683 – cenușiu “ash-grey”.^[5]
• 1688 – încenușa “to turn to ash”; the Bucharest Bible uses cenușă some thirty times.^[5][13]
• 1840 – cenușăreasă, the woman who gathers ash and the heroine of the folk tales.^[5]

Meanings

Noun

1. ash, ashes: the fine mineral powder left after something has burnt completely.^[6][11][1]
2. The remains of a cremated person.^[6][2]
3. cenușă vulcanică: volcanic ash, the fine matter thrown into the air by an erupting volcano.^[6]

Word family

• cenușar
• cenușăreasă
• cenușărie
• cenușăriță
• cenușiu
• cenușoară
• încenușa

Related words

• scrum
• spuză
• Aromanian cinushi

Usage notes

Common phrases: a (se) preface în cenușă “to burn to the ground”, a nu avea nici cenușă în vatră “to be destitute”, and a-și pune cenușă în cap “to admit one's fault”.^[6][11] The plural is cenuși.^[6][1]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c Scriban, August (1939), Dicționaru limbii românești (etimologii, înțelesuri, exemple, citațiuni, arhaizme, neologizme, provincializme), Iași: Presa Bună, p. 258
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. cenușă
4. ^ 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. cenușă
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k 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. cenușă
6. ^ a b c d e f g h i DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 170
7. ^ Cunia, Tiberius (2008), Dictsiunar a limbãljei armãneascã, Editsii Timpurarã (after T. Papahagi, Ș. Mihăileanu and I. Dalametra; online at dixionline.net), p. 306
8. ^ Capidan, Theodor (1935), Meglenoromânii III: Dicționar meglenoromân, București: Academia Română, p. 94
9. ^ Kovačec, August (1998), Istrorumunjsko-hrvatski rječnik (s gramatikom i tekstovima), Pula
10. ^ 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. cenușă
11. ^ 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, 359
12. ^ Ungureanu, Mădălina; Gînsac, Ana-Maria; Moruz, Alexandru (eds.), eRomLex: The First Romanian Bilingual Dictionaries (17th century), Iași: Universitatea „Alexandru Ioan Cuza”, https://scriptadacoromanica.ro
13. ^ Biblia, adecă Dumnezeiasca Scriptură a ceii vechi și a ceii noao leage, București, 1688 (ed. 1988, tricentennial edition), p. Facerea 18:27