divorța

Forms

divorța (third-person singular present divorțează, past participle divorțat) 1st conjugation^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from French divorcer (“to divorce”), with ⟨ț⟩ after the noun divorț.^[2][3][4][1] MDA2 and NODEX give the French verb alone,^[5][6] while Tiktin and CADE derive the verb from the Romanian noun.^[7][8] DN also compares Italian divorzare.^[9] The French verb is formed on divorce with the verb ending -er.^[1]

The Romanian noun, recorded from 1837, is a learned borrowing of Latin dīvortium (“separation; divorce”) together with the French noun;^[2] DELR derives the Latin word from dīvertō (“to go different ways, to separate”), a compound of dis- and vertō (“to turn”).^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

DELR's first record is from 1862, in the form divorți, in Antonescu's dictionary.^[2] Tiktin's is Barcianu's dictionary of 1868, and MDA2's Laurian and Massim's dictionary of 1871.^[7][5] The sense was that of spouses separating by divorce;^[7] Tiktin glosses it “to get divorced”.^[7]

Semantic evolution

Besides the intransitive use of the spouses, the verb has a causative transitive one, “to make someone divorce”: Caragiale's „Păi de ce am desvorțat-o pe Zița de el” “so why did I get Zița divorced from him”, with the variant desvorța.^[4][3] The person one divorces is introduced by de “from”.^[4]

A figurative sense, “to break with something, to be at odds with it”, is in Șăineanu's dictionary: a divorța de bunul simț “to part company with common sense”.^[10][5] DELR records the old variants divorția and dezvorța.^[2]

Timeline

• 1837 – the noun divorț.^[2][5]
• 1862 – the verb, as divorți, in Antonescu's dictionary.^[2]
• 1868 – in Barcianu's dictionary.^[7]
• 1871 – in Laurian and Massim's dictionary.^[5]
• 1929 – the figurative “to break with” in Șăineanu.^[10]

Meanings

Verb

1. (intransitive) Of spouses: to divorce, to end a marriage legally.^[3][5]
2. (transitive) To make someone separate from a spouse by divorce.^[3]
3. (figurative) To break with something, to be at odds with it.^[5][10]

Related words

• divorț
• divorțial

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g 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. divorț
3. ^ a b c d DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 324
4. ^ a b c Academia Română (1965–2010), Dicționarul limbii române (DLR), serie nouă, tom I–XIX, București: Editura Academiei Române, p. s.v. divorța
5. ^ 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, 736
6. ^ Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2002), Noul dicționar explicativ al limbii române, București: Litera Internațional, p. s.v. divorța
7. ^ a b c d e Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. divorța
8. ^ Candrea, I.-A.; Adamescu, Gh. (1926–1931), Dicționarul enciclopedic ilustrat „Cartea Românească”, București: Cartea Românească, p. s.v. divorța
9. ^ Marcu, Florin; Maneca, Constant (1986), Dicționar de neologisme, 3rd ed., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Socialiste România
10. ^ a b c Șăineanu, Lazăr (1929), Dicționar universal al limbei române, 6th ed., Craiova: Scrisul Românesc, p. 215