chin

Forms

chin n (plural chinuri)^[1] Besides chinuri, old texts have a plural chinure.^[2] In the Moldovan Cyrillic alphabet the word was written кин.^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Hungarian kín (“torment, pain”), as all the dictionaries agree.^{[3][4][2][5][1][6][7]} Ciorănescu places the borrowing in the 15th century or earlier.^[4] The Hungarian word passed into Serbo-Croatian too, as kina.^[4][8]

The Hungarian word is recorded from the late 12th century and is an Old Turkic loan from before the Hungarian conquest, related to Chuvash хӗн (hĕn).^{[9][8][10][1]} Roesler and Popescu-Ciocănel derived the Romanian word instead from Ottoman Turkish کین (kin, “hatred”), which comes from Persian.^[4][11] The old sense “passion” follows Old Church Slavonic страсть (strastĭ).^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

DELR dates the first record to about 1500.^[3] The early 16th-century Psaltirea Hurmuzaki has chinul at Psalm 11:5, and the later psalters have it in the same verse.^[12] Tiktin quotes the Psaltirea Scheiană, MDA2 the Codicele Voronețean.^[5][2] The sense is physical and mental torment.^[5][2]

Semantic evolution

The core sense is torture and severe pain, which widened to moral suffering, sorrow, care and need.^[2][4] The Slavonic–Romanian lexicons of the 17th century use chin for Slavonic “passion”, and MDA2 keeps “passion” as an old sense.^[13][2][3] Klein's dictionary of 1801 gives Latin supplicium and tortura.^[7]

The verb chinui “to torment” is as old as the noun, and chinuitor “tormentor” follows in 1649.^[3] In Transylvania chinzui “to torture” was borrowed separately from kínoz.^[3][4] A proverb sets the word against vin “wine”: Domnii beau vin, robii beau chin “the lords drink wine, the serfs drink torment”.^[14]

Timeline

• c. 1500–1520 – chinul in the Psaltirea Hurmuzaki.^[12][3]
• c. 1500 – the verb chinui.^[3]
• c. 1563–1583 – in the Codicele Voronețean.^[2]
• 1649 – chinuitor “tormentor”.^[3]
• 1660 – the earliest of the Slavonic–Romanian lexicons renders Slavonic “passion” with chin.^[13]
• 1688 – often in the Bucharest Bible.^[15]
• 1691–1697 – chinuială “torment”.^[3]
• 1890 – the Transylvanian chinzui, from Hungarian.^[3]

Meanings

Noun

1. Severe physical suffering, torture.^[2][16][1]
2. Intense mental suffering, anguish.^[2][16]
3. Great trouble, care or need.^[2][14]
4. (obsolete) passion.^[2][3]

Word family

• chinui
• chinuială
• chinuit
• chinuitor
• chinuitură

Related words

• chinzui

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 1, 381
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l 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. chin
4. ^ 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. chin
5. ^ 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. chin
6. ^ Cihac, A. de (1879), Dictionnaire d'étymologie daco-romane II: Éléments slaves, magyars, turcs, grecs-moderne et albanais, Frankfurt am Main, p. 489
7. ^ a b Gáldi, László (ed.) (1944), Samuel Klein: Dictionarium valachico-latinum. Primul dicționar al limbii române, Budapest: Királyi Magyar Pázmány Péter Tudományegyetemi Román Intézet (Klein's dictionary of 1801, with Gáldi's etymological study), p. 108
8. ^ a b Gerstner, Károly (ed.) (2006–), Új magyar etimológiai szótár, Budapest: Nyelvtudományi Kutatóközpont; online at uesz.nytud.hu
9. ^ Benkő, Loránd (ed.) (1967–1976), A magyar nyelv történeti-etimológiai szótára, 3 vols., Budapest: Akadémiai Kiadó
10. ^ Zaicz, Gábor (ed.) (2006), Etimológiai szótár: magyar szavak és toldalékok eredete, Budapest: Tinta Könyvkiadó
11. ^ Nişanyan, Sevan, Nişanyan Sözlük: Çağdaş Türkçenin Etimolojisi (online edition)
12. ^ 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 11:5
13. ^ a b Ungureanu, Mădălina; Gînsac, Ana-Maria; Moruz, Alexandru (eds.), eRomLex: The First Romanian Bilingual Dictionaries (17th century), Iași: Universitatea „Alexandru Ioan Cuza”, https://scriptadacoromanica.ro
14. ^ a b Macrea, Dimitrie; Petrovici, Emil (coord.) (1955–1957), Dicționarul limbii romîne literare contemporane, 4 vols., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 1, 410
15. ^ Biblia, adecă Dumnezeiasca Scriptură a ceii vechi și a ceii noao leage, București, 1688 (ed. 1988, tricentennial edition)
16. ^ a b DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 179