clopot

Forms

clopot n (plural clopote)^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Old Church Slavonic клопотъ (klopotŭ, “noise, din”), from Proto-Slavic *klopotъ.^[2][3][4][1] In Old Church Slavonic the word meant a rattle or rumble, glossing Greek κτύπος (ktúpos).^[5][6] Ciorănescu derives it from the Slavonic verb for “to strike”, and the Bulgarian etymological dictionary from the imitative base ⟨klop-⟩ / ⟨klep-⟩ with the suffix ⟨-ot⟩ of sound words.^[3][7][2] The sense “bell” is not certain for Slavonic itself, but it is found in Bulgarian клопот (klopot, “cattle bell”), and Serbo-Croatian klepet (“sound of a cowbell”) and klepetuša (“cowbell”) are close to it.^[3][7] DELR assumes a first sense “thing that sounds”.^[2] Tiktin compares Serbo-Croatian klopot (“clatter”), and the Academy dictionary took the word from Bulgarian.^[8][9]

The word is old in Romanian: it survives south of the Danube as Aromanian cloput (“bell worn by sheep and goats”) and Megleno-Romanian cloput, which DELR takes as a sign of an early borrowing.^{[2][10][11][12]} Ciorănescu thinks that klopotar (“tame lamb”) came from Romanian.^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first records are the plurals clopote and clopotele in the Psaltirea Hurmuzaki of the early 16th century, at Psalm 150:5; the Voroneț, Coresi and Scheiană psalters have the verse too.^[13][2][8] The 17th-century Slavonic–Romanian lexicons use it to gloss Slavonic кимвалъ (kimvalŭ, “cymbal”) and звонъ (zvonŭ, “ringing, bell”), and Tiktin gives “cymbal” as an old sense from Mardarie's lexicon of 1649.^[14][8] The family is recorded even earlier: clopotniță “bell tower” appears in a document of 1498.^[2]

Semantic evolution

From the church bell the word passed to objects of the same shape: a bell-shaped part in industry, the diving bell (clopot scufundător) and a glass cover that keeps dust off food or laboratory material.^[15][4] It also names the sound of a bell, and in regional speech a loud voice.^[4] Regionally it names flowers with bell-shaped corollas, above all the Carpathian bellflower (Campanula carpatica).^[4][3][16]

Old texts have a masculine plural clopoți, used in the Bible of 1688;^[13] MDA2 also records clopeți.^[8][4] The phrase a trage clopotele “to ring the bells” came to mean “to spread a secret” and, in slang, “to court a woman”.^[15][3]

Timeline

• 1498 – the derivative clopotniță “bell tower” in a document.^[2]
• c. 1500–1520 – clopote, clopotele in the Psaltirea Hurmuzaki, the first record of the word.^[13][2]
• 1570 – clopot in Coresi's psalter.^[13]
• 1582 – clopoțel “little bell” in the Palia de la Orăștie.^[2]
• 1649 – Mardarie's lexicon glosses Slavonic “cymbal” with it.^[14][8]
• 1688 – the plural clopoți in the Bucharest Bible.^[8]
• 1691–1697 – the verb clopoți “to ring the bells” in Teodor Corbea's dictionary.^[2]
• 1759–1765 – clopotar “bell-ringer, bell-founder” in Gheorghe Maior's lexicon.^[2]
• c. 1782 – clopotărie “bell foundry”.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. A bell: a hollow metal object shaped like a pear, open below, with a movable clapper inside that strikes its sides and makes it ring.^[15][4][1]
2. The sound of a bell; a peal.^[15][3]
3. A bell-shaped part with various uses in industry;^{[17][18][19][20][1]} clopot scufundător: a diving bell, an air-fed working chamber for work under water.^[15][4]
4. A glass cover in the shape of a bell, used to keep dust off food or objects in laboratories; a bell jar.^[15][4]
5. (regional, botany) The Carpathian bellflower and some related plants.^[4][3]

Word family

• clopotar
• clopotărie
• clopotniță
• clopoțel
• clopoți

Related words

• Aromanian cloput

Usage notes

A trage clopotele means “to give away a secret” and, colloquially, “to court a woman”.^[15][4] A trage clopotul de mort is to toll the bell for someone's death.^[4] Leacu-i zeamă de clopot “the cure is bell broth” says that there is no hope of healing.^[4] A proverb has it that a cat wearing a bell catches no mice: Mâța cu clopot nu prinde șoareci.^[8]

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 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. clopot
3. ^ a b c d e f g h 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. clopot
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 1, 439
5. ^ Kurz, Josef; Hauptová, Zoe (eds.) (1958–1997), Slovník jazyka staroslověnského / Lexicon linguae palaeoslovenicae, 4 vols. + supplements, Praha: Academia; digital ed. gorazd.org
6. ^ Vasmer, Max (1964–1973), Ètimologičeskij slovar' russkogo jazyka, transl. and suppl. by O. N. Trubačev, 4 vols., Moskva: Progress, p. 2, 254
7. ^ a b Georgiev, Vladimir I. et al. (eds.) (1971–), Bălgarski etimologičen rečnik, Sofija: Izdatelstvo na Bălgarskata akademija na naukite, p. 2, 468
8. ^ a b c d e f g Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. clopot
9. ^ 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. clopot
10. ^ Papahagi, Tache (1963), Dicționarul dialectului aromân, general și etimologic, București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 296
11. ^ Pascu, Giorge (1925), Dictionnaire étymologique macédoroumain, 2 vols. (I: Les éléments latins et romans; II: Les éléments grecs, turcs, slaves, albanais, germaniques, magyars, néologismes, créations immédiates, obscurs), Iași: Cultura Națională, p. 2, 186
12. ^ Cunia, Tiberius (2008), Dictsiunar a limbãljei armãneascã, Editsii Timpurarã (after T. Papahagi, Ș. Mihăileanu and I. Dalametra; online at dixionline.net)
13. ^ a b c d 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 150:5
14. ^ 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, p. s.v. clopot
15. ^ 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. 197
16. ^ Panțu, Zach. C. (1929), Plantele cunoscute de poporul român. Vocabular botanic cuprinzând numirile române, franceze, germane și științifice, 2nd ed., București: Editura Casei Școalelor, p. 64
17. ^ Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 2, 891
18. ^ DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 1018
19. ^ Academia Română (1965–2010), Dicționarul limbii române (DLR), serie nouă, tom I–XIX, București: Editura Academiei Române, p. s.v. similar
20. ^ Costăchescu, Adriana; Dincă, Daniela; Dragoste, Ramona; Popescu, Mihaela; Scurtu, Gabriela (2009–2010), Dicționar de împrumuturi lexicale din limba franceză (DILF), 2 vols., Craiova: Universitaria, p. s.v. similar