conteni

Forms

conteni (third-person singular present contenește, past participle contenit), 4th conjugation^[1]

Etymology

DELR takes it as inherited from Latin contineō (“to hold together, keep in, restrain”), itself formed from con- and teneō (“to hold”), which moved early to the fourth conjugation of Romanian verbs.^[2] This is also the view of Tiktin, Candrea and Densusianu, CADE and DEX.^[2][3] Wiktionary calls it a doublet of conține.^[1] The verb survives south of the Danube: Aromanian acumtin and Megleno-Romanian cuntini.^[4][2][5]

The sound shape is the difficulty.^[2][4] Latin ⟨con-⟩ normally gave Romanian ⟨cu-⟩, and the /t/ of the simple verb became /ț/ in ține, so Pușcariu expected ⟨*cuținea⟩ from the Latin verb.^[6][1] DELR answers that the regular outcome would have been ⟨*cuntenea⟩, and that verbs such as cumpli and luci also passed from the second conjugation to the fourth; a form with ⟨ț⟩ would only show a later remaking after the simple verb.^[2] Ciorănescu thinks ⟨cun-⟩ for ⟨cu-⟩ possible, compare cumpăt, but the kept ⟨t⟩ hard to explain, and calls the origin obscure.^[4]

Pușcariu proposed instead Vulgar Latin *cunctinō, formed on cunctor (“to delay, hesitate”) with an iterative suffix; the DA and the REW followed him.^[6][2][7] DELR finds this hard to accept on semantic grounds.^[2] Ciorănescu allows a blend with Vulgar Latin *contenuō, for tenuō (“to make thin, lessen”).^[4] Cihac started from Modern Greek κονταίνω (kontaíno, “to shorten”), which DELR notes is itself from Italian contenere, and Șăineanu derived the verb from that Italian word through Byzantine Greek.^[4][2][8] Graur reviewed these proposals in 1975.^[9] Ciorănescu sees a sign of an old inherited word in the rhotacism of the 16th-century derivative cuntirimânt.^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

DELR's first record is the form cuntini in the Psaltirea Hurmuzaki of the early 16th century, and MDA2 cites the Codicele Voronețean (c. 1563–1583).^[2][10] In the old texts it meant “to hold back, restrain someone” and “to forbid”: the Bible of 1688 has „Și-i conteni pre ei ca nemărui să spuie” “and he charged them to tell no one” (Mark 7:36).^[11]

Semantic evolution

The old transitive senses “to restrain, keep in check” and “to forbid, order to stop” gave way to the intransitive “to stop, cease”, the usual sense today.^[4][2][10] Tiktin quotes the old construction a conteni cuiva “to forbid someone something” from the Bible of 1688 (Matthew 16:20).^[11] In the 17th-century Slavonic–Romanian lexicons contenesc glosses Slavonic verbs for forbidding and calming.^[12] Set phrases include a conteni din viață “to die” and a conteni din gură “to fall silent”.^[10]

The adjective necontenit “ceaseless”, recorded from 1693, is now the most common member of the family.^[2][4] The Banat and Oltenia dialects have first-conjugation forms such as contena, which DELR takes for a late regrouping, since they are missing from the old language.^[2]

Timeline

• c. 1500-1520 – cuntini and the noun cuntinrit “prohibition” in the Psaltirea Hurmuzaki.^[2]
• 1551-1553 – cuntenitură “prohibition” in the Slavonic–Romanian Gospel.^[2]
• 1570 – contenim in Coresi's Psalter (Psalm 73:9).^[13]
• c. 1563-1583 – in the Codicele Voronețean.^[10]
• 1613 – the variant înconteni, in Varlaam's Leastvița.^[2]
• 1656 – the noun conteneală.^[2]
• 1660 – contenesc in a Slavonic–Romanian lexicon.^[12]
• 1688 – contenitor “restraining” in the Bucharest Bible.^[2]
• 1693 – necontenit “ceaseless”.^[2]

Meanings

Verb

1. (intransitive) To stop or cease, to break off an action or a movement once begun: Ploaia a contenit spre seară.^[3][10]
2. (transitive) To stop something, to bring it to an end.^[3][10][14]
3. (of rain, wind, pain, weeping) To abate, die down.^[10]
4. (dated) To restrain someone, hold back; to forbid, order someone to stop.^[4][10][11]
5. In set phrases: a conteni din viață “to die”, a conteni din gură “to fall silent”.^[10]

Word family

• conteneală
• contenit
• cuntenitură
• necontenit
• înconteni

Related words

• conține
• ține
• Aromanian acumtin
• Latin contineō

References

1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r 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. conteni
3. ^ a b c DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 227
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i 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. conteni
5. ^ Papahagi, Tache (1963), Dicționarul dialectului aromân, general și etimologic, București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 54
6. ^ a b 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. conteni
7. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 2391
8. ^ Șăineanu, Lazăr (1929), Dicționar universal al limbei române, 6th ed., Craiova: Scrisul Românesc, p. 1, 163
9. ^ Graur, Alexandru (1975), Alte etimologii românești, București: Editura Academiei Republicii Socialiste România, p. s.v. conteni
10. ^ a b c d e f g h i Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 1, 494
11. ^ 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. conteni
12. ^ 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. contenesc
13. ^ 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 73:9
14. ^ Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2002), Noul dicționar explicativ al limbii române, București: Litera Internațional, p. s.v. conteni