costa

Forms

costa (third-person singular present costă, past participle costat), first conjugation^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Italian costare (“to cost”), a word of trade of the early 19th century.^{[2][3][4][5][6][1]} According to the DA, MDA2 and Tiktin it is also borrowed from German kosten;^[3][4][5] Scriban names French coûter instead.^[3][4][5] Ciorănescu notes that it is not found in texts before the 19th century but soon came into general use through commerce.^[2]

The Italian verb continues Vulgar Latin cōstāre, from Latin cōnstō (“to stand firm, to be established; to cost”), a compound of con- and stō (“to stand”).^[3][7] The German verb came the same way, through Old French coster.^[8] The same Latin verb gave the inherited custa “to live”, a doublet of this verb, and the learned consta.^[3][1]

Older Romanian had other forms of the verb.^[2][3] Costisi is from Modern Greek κοστίζω (kostízo), itself from the Italian verb.^[2][3] The Transylvanian coștălui is from Hungarian kóstál.^[3] Ciorănescu derives the variant with ⟨u⟩ from confusion with the doublet.^[2] South of the Danube the verb is Aromanian custisire, from the same Greek verb.^[9][10]

Earliest recorded meaning

MDA2 and Tiktin date it to 1816, in a document published by Iorga.^[4][5] DELR's first record is Polizu's Romanian–German vocabulary of 1857;^[3] Transylvanian coștului is recorded from 1814.^[3]

Semantic evolution

From the price of a thing in money the verb passed to what something costs in effort or sacrifice.^[6][11] In Transylvania it also means “to be worth”.^[3] The phrase ce mă costă? means “what have I got to lose?”.^[6][4]

The noun cost, recorded from 1840, is from costo; the DA also considered Kosten, which DELR thinks less likely because the German is a plural.^[3] The adjective costisitor “expensive” is formed on costisi and dates from 1836.^[3]

Timeline

• 1814 – the Transylvanian coștului.^[3]
• 1816 – costa in a document published by Iorga.^[4][5]
• 1835 – costisi.^[3]
• 1836 – costisitor “expensive”.^[3]
• 1840 – the noun cost.^[3]
• 1857 – costa in Polizu's vocabulary.^[3]
• 1929 – necostisitor “inexpensive” in Arghezi.^[3]

Meanings

Verb

1. (intransitive) To cost: to have a price, a value in money; to be obtainable only for a price; to be expensive.^[6][5]
2. (intransitive and transitive) To be paid for or gained at the price of something other than money, such as effort or sacrifice.^[6][11]
3. (regional, Transylvania) To be worth.^[3]

Word family

• cost
• costător
• costisi
• costisitor
• coștălui

Related words

• custa
• consta
• Latin cōnstō

Usage notes

Ce mă costă? “what have I got to lose?” and nu mă costă nimic “it is no effort for me” are common phrases.^[6] The old verb custa “to live”, inherited from Latin, is also spelled costa, and custa occurs in turn as a variant of costa “to cost”.^{[12][3][4][1]}

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e 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. costa
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u 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. costa
4. ^ a b c d e f g Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 1, 521
5. ^ a b c d e f Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. costa
6. ^ a b c d e f DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 241
7. ^ Cortelazzo, Manlio; Zolli, Paolo (1999), Dizionario etimologico della lingua italiana, 2nd ed. by Manlio Cortelazzo and Michele A. Cortelazzo, Bologna: Zanichelli, p. s.v. costare
8. ^ Kluge, Friedrich; Seebold, Elmar (2011), Etymologisches Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache, 25th ed., Berlin / Boston: De Gruyter, p. 534
9. ^ 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. 1, 207
10. ^ Papahagi, Tache (1963), Dicționarul dialectului aromân, general și etimologic, București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 343
11. ^ a b Marcu, Florin (2000), Marele dicționar de neologisme, București: Saeculum Vizual, p. s.v. costa
12. ^ 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. custa