dejun

Forms

dejun n (plural dejunuri)^[1] The first records, of 1829, have forms taken straight from the French infinitive: „Au urmat în curtea mitropoliei un dejene” “a collation followed in the courtyard of the metropolitan see”, and dejone “food before the midday meal”.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is a back-formation from Romanian dejuna (“to have lunch”), made on the model of ajun beside ajuna.^{[3][4][2][5][6]} The verb and the older noun dejene are from French déjeuner, a verb (first “to break one's fast”) whose infinitive French also uses as a noun.^[3][5] Wiktionary and DEX 1998 derive the noun directly from the French word.^[1][7] The French verb continues Vulgar Latin *disiūnō, from Medieval Latin disiēiūnō (“to break a fast”), from Latin iēiūnō (“to fast”), a term of the Late Latin church, and that from iēiūnus (“fasting, hungry”).^[3][8] The inherited Romanian verb for fasting has the same Latin source, and it shaped the Romanian form of the loan.^[3] The phrase mic dejun “breakfast” is modelled on French petit déjeuner.^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first records are of 1829, in the forms dejene and dejone for a light meal, glossed gustare “snack” in one record and “food before the midday meal” in another.^[2][3][5] Tiktin dates dejun itself to 1829 as well, while DELR's first record of this form is of 1840.^[9][3] Negulici's dictionary (1848) explains it as a snack, food eaten in the morning.^[10]

Semantic evolution

The French word moved from the first meal of the day to the midday meal when meal times changed.^[8] Romanian took both senses: the morning meal in the first records and Negulici, and the main meal at midday from 1833, when a dejone for 200 people is reported.^[2][10] Today dejun alone means lunch, and the morning meal is micul dejun, sometimes written as one word mic-dejun.^[3][6] Scriban marked the word as a barbarism for the native prânz.^[11]

Timeline

• 1829 – dejene and dejone, the first records.^[2][3][5]
• c. 1832 – the verb dejuna in Iordache Golescu's Condica limbii rumânești.^[3][5]
• 1833 – dejone for a large midday meal.^[2]
• 1840 – dejun in Donescu, DELR's first record of the form.^[3]
• 1848 – Negulici's dictionary: “snack, food eaten in the morning”.^[10]

Meanings

Noun

1. lunch: the midday meal; prânz.^[6][1]
2. micul dejun: breakfast, the morning meal.^[6][12]
3. The time of day when one of these meals is eaten.^[6][5]

Related words

• dejuna
• ajun

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f Academia Română (1965–2010), Dicționarul limbii române (DLR), serie nouă, tom I–XIX, București: Editura Academiei Române, p. s.v. dejun
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l 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. dejuna
4. ^ 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. dejuna
5. ^ a b c d e f Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 1, 634
6. ^ a b c d e DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 284
7. ^ Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan” (1998), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române, 2nd ed., București: Univers Enciclopedic, p. 273
8. ^ a b Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
9. ^ Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. dejun
10. ^ a b c 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, p. s.v. dejun
11. ^ Scriban, August (1939), Dicționaru limbii românești (etimologii, înțelesuri, exemple, citațiuni, arhaizme, neologizme, provincializme), Iași: Presa Bună, p. 400
12. ^ Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2002), Noul dicționar explicativ al limbii române, București: Litera Internațional, p. s.v. dejun