desfăta

Forms

desfăta (third-person singular present desfată, past participle desfătat) 1st conjugation^[1]

Etymology

Its origin is unknown: DEX and NODEX give no etymology, Tiktin calls it obscure though plainly Latin, and DELR sets out the proposals without choosing one.^[2][3][4][5]

Ciorănescu derives it from Latin foeteō (“to stink, to disgust”) with the prefix dis-, which turns the sense round, a view already suggested by Șăineanu.^[6][7] For the meaning he compares Spanish heder “to stink” and “to annoy”, the Romanian dezmierda and Old Church Slavonic нѣга (něga) “cleaning of a child” and “delight”, and he holds this the best explanation, though it has found little acceptance.^[6] Wiktionary follows it.^[1] DELR objects that it presupposes a Romanian verb *făta “to clean a child”, unlikely because it would have clashed with făta “to give birth”.^[5]

The other proposals, as Ciorănescu and DELR list them: faciēs (“face, appearance”) (Cihac); Vulgar Latin *satisfactō (Crețu); *disfatō, from fātum (“fate”), “to lift a spell” (Pușcariu); *diseffētō “to drive away tiredness”, from effētus (“exhausted”) (Densusianu), which would account for the old sense “to stretch out”; a formation of the same prefix on the stem of fēta (“having given birth, fertile”), with a first sense “to be fertile, abundant” or “to frolic” said of young animals (Spitzer, accepted by the REW); and *disfatuō “to amuse”, from fatuus (“insipid”), compare Portuguese desenfadar (Buescu, 1952).^[6][5][8] The DLR and G. Mihăilă take it as Romanian, from Romanian des- + fată, from a sense “to lose one's maidenhood” that led to “to feel sensual pleasure”.^[5][9] The Oltenian variant desfăida is a reshaping of it.^[5][10]

Earliest recorded meaning

DELR's first record is the participle desfătat “at length, broadly”, spelled desvătat, in Coresi's Tâlcul evangheliilor of 1567–1568; the personal forms follow in Coresi's psalter of 1589.^[5] There the second person desfătași occurs in Psalm 4.^[11] The early senses were spatial: “to extend”, and “to adorn”, as in a chronicle that says of a church that Prince Mihai „au mărit-o și au desfătat-o” “enlarged it and adorned it”.^[10][4][6] In Mardarie's Slavonic–Romanian lexicon of 1649 desfătat glosses a Slavonic word for “spaciously”.^[12]

Semantic evolution

From the old spatial senses, “to stretch, to spread” and “to lie down somewhere to rest”, which DELR records mainly in the participle, the verb passed to joy and pleasure.^[5][10] By the 17th century the reflexive meant “to take one's pleasure, to make merry”: Varlaam pairs it with dezmierda “to indulge oneself”, and Antim contrasts the sinner who „să bucura, să desfăta şi râdea” “rejoiced, delighted and laughed” with the penitent who must weep.^[9] The transitive “to delight, to charm” is the modern use: a spectacle that delights the eyes, a wine that gladdens.^[2][13]

The adjective desfătat “beautiful, pleasant” appears in 1613, desfătăciune “delight” in Milescu, and desfătător “delightful” about 1730.^[5]

Timeline

• 1567–1568 – the participle desvătat “at length” in Coresi's Tâlcul evangheliilor, the first record.^[5]
• c. 1573–1578 – the Psaltirea Scheiană, MDA2's first record.^[10]
• 1589 – desfătași in Coresi's psalter.^[5][11]
• 1613 – the adjective desfătat “beautiful, pleasant” in Varlaam's Leastvița.^[5]
• 1646 – the Moldavian Pravila, Tiktin's first record.^[4]
• 1649 – desfătat in Mardarie's lexicon.^[12]
• 1651–1680 – desfătăciune “delight” in Milescu.^[5]
• 1688 – the Bucharest Bible uses the verb in Esther, the Psalms and Isaiah.^[14]
• c. 1730 – desfătător “delightful” in Axinte Uricariul's chronicle.^[5]
• 1866 – the verbal noun desfătat in Alecsandri.^[5]

Meanings

Verb

1. (reflexive) To spend one's time in contentment and joy; to enjoy oneself, to have fun; to take great delight in something: Copiii se desfătau la săniuș.^[2][10]
2. (transitive) To charm, to enchant, to delight: Peisajul desfăta privirea.^[2][3]
3. (obsolete) To extend, to enlarge; to adorn.^[10][6][4]

Word family

• desfăt
• desfătat
• desfătăcios
• desfătăciune
• desfătător
• desfătare

Usage notes

The present is desfăt, also desfătez.^[2][10] The obsolete phrase a se desfăta în sine meant “to be pleased with oneself”.^[10]

References

1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 298
3. ^ a b Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2002), Noul dicționar explicativ al limbii române, București: Litera Internațional, p. s.v. desfăta
4. ^ a b c d Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. desfăta
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n 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. desfăta
6. ^ 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. desfăta
7. ^ Șăineanu, Lazăr (1929), Dicționar universal al limbei române, 6th ed., Craiova: Scrisul Românesc, p. 1, 202
8. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 3269
9. ^ a b Academia Română (1965–2010), Dicționarul limbii române (DLR), serie nouă, tom I–XIX, București: Editura Academiei Române, p. s.v. desfăta
10. ^ a b c d e f g h Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 1, 663
11. ^ a b Gînsac, Ana-Maria; Ungureanu, Mădălina; Moruz, Alexandru et al., roPsalt: Re-evaluating the Sixteenth Century Romanian Psalters (aligned corpus), Iași: Universitatea „Alexandru Ioan Cuza”, https://scriptadacoromanica.ro, p. Ps 4:1
12. ^ a b Ungureanu, Mădălina; Gînsac, Ana-Maria; Moruz, Alexandru (eds.), eRomLex: The First Romanian Bilingual Dictionaries (17th century), Iași: Universitatea „Alexandru Ioan Cuza”, https://scriptadacoromanica.ro, p. s.v. desfătat
13. ^ Macrea, Dimitrie; Petrovici, Emil (coord.) (1955–1957), Dicționarul limbii romîne literare contemporane, 4 vols., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 2, 70
14. ^ Biblia, adecă Dumnezeiasca Scriptură a ceii vechi și a ceii noao leage, București, 1688 (ed. 1988, tricentennial edition), p. Esther 3:15