cresta

Forms

cresta (third-person singular present crestează, past participle crestat), first conjugation^[1] Beside the usual present crestez, Tiktin records a present crest.^[2] A prefixed variant încresta is in use with the same senses.^[3] Tiktin cites it from Coșbuc.^[2]

Etymology

Most dictionaries take it as a verb formed from Romanian creastă (“crest, comb”), so that it first meant to cut something into the shape of a cock's comb.^[2][4][5][6] The noun goes back to Latin crista (“crest”).^[7] DELR adds that the sense of making a cut or a mark was influenced by a Slavonic verb meaning to make the sign of the cross, formed on the word for cross, which gave the sense of a cross-shaped cut.^[5] DA had already explained it this way.^[5][4]

Ciorănescu rejects the derivation from the noun as semantically weak and takes the verb from Latin castrō (“to castrate”) instead, which would make it a doublet of the 19th-century loan castra; for the vowel he compares repede from rapidus, and for the sense the Abruzzese and Calabrian forms that mean cutting a tree's main stem or an irrigation channel.^[8] He grants that speakers have mixed the verb with creastă in any case.^[8] Wiktionary follows him, comparing Occitan crestar (“to castrate”) and Portuguese crestar (“to take honey from a hive”); the REW lists the Occitan and Portuguese forms under the Latin verb.^[1][9] Scriban's derivation from a Russian and Ukrainian verb meaning to make the sign of the cross is reported by Ciorănescu and DELR as a third view.^[8][5]

Earliest recorded meaning

DELR dates the first record to about 1650, in the glossary cited as Anonymus Caransebesiensis, with the sense of making cuts in a surface or along an edge.^[5] Tiktin dates the same source about 1670.^[5][2] The agent noun crestător, the man who notched on a tally stick how much the labourers had worked, is recorded earlier, in a document of 1600.^[5]

Semantic evolution

DA describes the oldest sense as cutting something into the shape of a crest, still seen in kitchen use: scoring bacon down to the rind so that the slice opens out like a cock's comb, or scoring meat before roasting.^[4][3] Under the influence of the Slavonic word for “cross”, a cross-shaped cut appeared beside it, as in cutting an onion or a radish crosswise so that the salt soaks in.^[4][3] From there the verb widened to any notch or incision, to ornamental notches cut in wood, and to a mark made by a cut.^[4][3]

The tally stick gave the phrase a cresta pe răboj, literally “to notch on the tally”, used figuratively for noting something and keeping it in mind, often in order to pay it back later.^[3][6] The reflexive a se cresta means to cut oneself slightly.^[6][2] In the slang of the underworld the verb means to wound someone with a knife.^[10]

Timeline

• 1600 – crestător “one who notches a tally”, in a document.^[5]
• 1649 – crestețel, the plant name later written crestățel, in Mardarie's lexicon.^[5]
• c. 1650 – cresta and crestătură “incision, notch” in the Anonymus Caransebesiensis.^[5]
• 1691–1697 – crestat “crested; notched” in Teodor Corbea's dictionary, which DELR takes from Latin cristātus.^[5]
• 1885 – crestățel, the potter's tool for notching the rims of pots.^[5]
• 1901 – crestare “incision; notched outline”, in Mehedinți.^[5]

Meanings

Verb

1. To make cuts or notches on a surface or along the edge of an object; to cut teeth or points into something: Ciobanul a crestat marginea bâtei.^[6][3]
2. To mark something with a cut;^[6][3] a cresta pe răboj, to notch on a tally stick, and figuratively to take note of something and remember it.^[6][3]
3. To score meat or bacon before cooking, or to cut an onion or radish crosswise.^[3][4]
4. (reflexive) To cut oneself slightly, to nick oneself.^[6][2]

Word family

• crestat
• crestățel
• crestătură
• crestare
• încresta
• crestător

Related words

• castra
• creastă

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ 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. crestá
3. ^ 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, 546
4. ^ a b c d e f 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. crestá
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m 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. cresta
6. ^ 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. 249
7. ^ 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. creastă
8. ^ a b c 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. cresta
9. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 1749
10. ^ Volceanov, George (2007), Dicționar de argou al limbii române, București: Niculescu, p. s.v. cresta