comandă

Forms

comandă f (plural comenzi)^[1] Nicolae Costin has the old form comendie;^[2][3] MDA2 also lists comendă and the old plurals comande and comănzi.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is borrowed from German Kommando, with French commande as a further model; the old form ⟨comendie⟩ points to Polish komenda.^[4][3][2] Ciorănescu derives the noun from German and, earlier, in the 18th century, from Polish, and treats it as belonging to the verb comanda, from French commander.^[5] Wiktionary and Scriban give French alone.^[1][6] The German noun belongs to kommandieren, borrowed from that French verb, from early Romance *commandō, a form of commendō (“to entrust”) remade after mandō.^[7]

Earliest recorded meaning

Tiktin dates the first record to about 1710, in Nicolae Costin's chronicle, where the word is written comendie.^[2][3] A chronicle passage quoted by the DA uses it for the command of an army: a man asks to be given the command of the troops, promising to finish the work in two or three hours.^[4]

Semantic evolution

From the authority of an army commander the word passed to the order itself, especially the word of command for a drill movement, and to the headquarters.^[4][3] The commercial sense, an order given to a craftsman or merchant, came with French commande: de comandă “made to measure”, and figuratively “feigned”, as in lacrimi de comandă “crocodile tears”.^[4][6] Technical senses followed in the 20th century: the operation that starts or stops a machine, the control gear itself, and post de comandă.^[8] In the Banat military border of Austria the comandă was the village hall, and a fi de comandă meant to be on guard at the border.^[2][9][3]

Timeline

• c. 1710 – comendie in Nicolae Costin's chronicle, the first record.^[2]
• 1848 – “a thing given to be made” in Negulici's dictionary.^[10]
• 1865 – Pisone glosses it with Latin imperium and German Kommando.^[11]
• 1966 – comandă-program in automatic control.^[12]

Meanings

Noun

1. An order, a command; the order to perform a movement or an exercise: ton de comandă “a commanding tone”;^[8][3] la comandă “on demand; at will, on purpose”.^[8][3]
2. The leadership of a military unit, and its exercise: post de comandă “command post”.^[8]
3. An operation, manual or automatic, that starts, regulates or stops a technical system; the controls themselves.^[8][1]
4. The bridge of a ship, from which it is steered.^[8]
5. A request for goods, work or a service: haine de comandă “made-to-measure clothes”.^[8][3]
6. (regional, Banat) A border guard post; the village hall in the old military border.^[3][2]

Related words

• comanda
• comandant
• comandament

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ 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. comandă
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 1, 467
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. comandă
5. ^ 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. comanda
6. ^ a b Scriban, August (1939), Dicționaru limbii românești (etimologii, înțelesuri, exemple, citațiuni, arhaizme, neologizme, provincializme), Iași: Presa Bună, p. 320
7. ^ Kluge, Friedrich; Seebold, Elmar (2011), Etymologisches Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache, 25th ed., Berlin / Boston: De Gruyter, p. 516
8. ^ 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. 208
9. ^ Candrea, I.-A.; Adamescu, Gh. (1926–1931), Dicționarul enciclopedic ilustrat „Cartea Românească”, București: Cartea Românească, p. s.v. comandă
10. ^ 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. s.v. comandă
11. ^ Pisone, Domițian (1865), Dictionariu românescu, latinescu, germanescu și francescu, lucrat după sistemul Lexiconului de Buda, București: Typografia Ioann Weiss, p. 85
12. ^ Dimitrescu, Florica (1997), Dicționar de cuvinte recente, 2nd ed., București: Logos (with the 3rd ed., 2013, in CLRE), p. s.v. comandă