cutreiera

Forms

cutreiera (third-person singular present cutreieră, past participle cutreierat, third-person subjunctive cutreiere) 1st conjugation^[1] The regional variant cutriera is the Moldavian form;^[2][3] cutriira is rare.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin contrībulō (“to crush, tread down”), formed from con- and trībulō (“to thresh, crush”), which gave treiera.^{[4][5][3][6][1]} The Latin verb comes from trībulum, the heavy board dragged over the ears of grain to thresh them, itself from the stem of terō (“to rub, grind”).^[4][7] Pușcariu and the REW gave the same etymon.^[5] It survives south of the Danube as Aromanian cutrivir.^[5]

Tiktin thought the form with ⟨-tré-⟩ younger than the one with ⟨-trí-⟩ that the old texts and Moldavian speech have, though the sister languages partly reflect a Latin short vowel: Italian trebbiare beside tribbiare.^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

Tiktin's first record is Coresi's Apostle of 1563, at Acts 15:41, where Paul goes through Syria and Cilicia;^[2][4] DELR dates the same Coresi text 1566, in the form cutriera.^[2][4] MDA2 has it first in Dosoftei's Lives of the Saints (1682–1686): „20 de ai cutrierând prin orașele Italiei” “wandering twenty years through the cities of Italy”.^[3][2]

Semantic evolution

Tiktin explains the sense from threshing with animals: the verb meant “to thresh all over”, and so, like the treading beast, to go over a space until every spot of it has been stepped on.^[2] DER also refers to tribulație for the development of the meaning.^[5] From “to roam all over” it came to mean “to wander, rove”, and with a place as its object “to frequent”: Dosoftei has the faithful going round the holy churches „cu rugă și cu lumini” “with prayer and with candles”.^[8][5] The writers of the 19th century used it for clouds, light and shivers running through something, and rarely in the reflexive for peoples passing one after another.^[8][6]

Timeline

• 1563 – in Coresi's Apostle (Acts 15:41), the first record.^[2]
• 1566 – cutriera in Coresi, the date DELR gives.^[4]
• 1682 – cutrierătură “roaming” in Dosoftei's Lives of the Saints.^[4]
• c. 1848 – cutrierător “roaming; adventurer” in Barițiu.^[4]
• 1855 – the verbal noun cutrierat in Russo.^[4]
• 1881 – the noun cutreier “constant coming and going” in Eminescu.^[4]

Meanings

Verb

1. (transitive) To roam all over, travel through far and wide, go from place to place; by extension, to wander about idly.^[6][3][1]
2. (transitive) To go often to a place, to frequent: Toată vara a cutreierat muzeele orașului.^[6][3]
3. (reflexive, unusual) To pass by one after another, file past.^[6][3]

Word family

• cutreier
• cutreierat
• cutreierătură
• cutreierător

Related words

• treiera
• Aromanian cutrivir

References

1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. cutreiera
3. ^ 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, 586
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i 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. cutreiera
5. ^ 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. cutreiera
6. ^ a b c d e DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 1, 265
7. ^ Graur, Alexandru (1980), Cuvinte înrudite, București: Editura Științifică și Enciclopedică, p. 101
8. ^ 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. cutreiera