criminal

Forms

criminal m (plural criminali, feminine equivalent criminală)^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from French criminel and, as a learned loan, borrowed from Latin criminālis: DELR, DEX, MDA2 and Wiktionary name both sources.^[2][3][4][1] The neologism dictionaries give the Latin word first and compare French.^[5][6] The Latin adjective, “relating to a crime”, is formed on crīmen (“charge, accusation, crime”).^[7][1]

Popular speech reshaped it as cremenal, by association with cremene “flint” and încremeni “to be petrified”, and as cremenar and criminar in the north of Transylvania, Bukovina and Moldavia.^[8][9]

Earliest recorded meaning

DELR dates the adjective to 1736, in a document published in Iorga's Studii și documente, with the senses “wicked, guilty of a crime; constituting a crime; concerning the trial of crimes”.^[2] Tiktin's first record is from 1775.^[10] MDA2 starts from the Wallachian law code of Caragea (1818): „Prigonire iaste, ori criminală, sau politicească” “a prosecution is either criminal or civil”.^[4][8]

Semantic evolution

The adjective was at first a legal term: criminal procedure, criminal courts, a criminal code, beside the adjectives criminalicesc (1814) and criminalic (1833) that went out of use.^[8][2] From the law it spread to any deed that is a crime or close to one, and to the wicked intention behind it.^[8][3] As a noun it named the person who committed a crime, and in modern Romanian especially a murderer.^[3][1] The phrase criminal de război “war criminal” names a person guilty of crimes against the laws of war, peace and humanity.^[3]

Its family took in new legal and scientific terms from French and German: criminalitate (1840), criminalist (c. 1832), criminologie (1901) and criminalistică (1966).^[2]

Timeline

• 1736 – first record of the adjective, in a document published by Iorga.^[2]
• 1775 – first record in Tiktin.^[10]
• 1814 – criminalicesc and criminalicește in the Pravila of Donici.^[2]
• 1818 – criminală in Caragea's law code, MDA2's first record of the adjective.^[4][8]
• 1840 – criminalitate “criminality”.^[2]
• 1847 – criminalist in the popular sense “criminal”, derived from the adjective.^[2]
• 1848 – criminal in Negulici's dictionary of neologisms, as an adjective and a noun.^[11]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Constituting a crime or relating to one; showing a wicked intent: o faptă criminală.^[3][9]
2. murderous, homicidal.^[1]
3. (law) Relating to the trial and punishment of crimes, penal.^[8][9]

Noun

1. A criminal, a person who has committed a crime; especially a murderer.^[3][1]
2. criminal de război: a war criminal.^[3]

Related words

• criminalitate
• crimă
• criminolog
• Latin crīmen

Usage notes

DEX has a separate word criminal¹, an obsolete neuter noun (plural criminaluri) for the court that tried crimes and, by extension, a prison: „vrei să te ducă la criminal?” “do you want them to take you to the criminal court?”, from the periodical Contemporanul.^[3][8] DEX and MDA2 derive it from German Kriminal(gericht) “criminal court”, while DELR and the DA give French and German both;^[3][4][2][8] DELR dates it to 1807.^[3][4][2][8]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j 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. crimă
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 250
4. ^ a b c d e Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 1, 549
5. ^ Marcu, Florin; Maneca, Constant (1986), Dicționar de neologisme, 3rd ed., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Socialiste România
6. ^ Marcu, Florin (2000), Marele dicționar de neologisme, București: Saeculum Vizual
7. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ a b c d e f g h i 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. criminal
9. ^ a b c Scriban, August (1939), Dicționaru limbii românești (etimologii, înțelesuri, exemple, citațiuni, arhaizme, neologizme, provincializme), Iași: Presa Bună, p. 365
10. ^ a b Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. criminal
11. ^ 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