eșec

Forms

eșec n (plural eșecuri)^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from French échec, a 19th-century loan.^{[2][3][4][5][1]} In French the word first named the position of a king under attack in chess.^[3] It continues Old French eschec, an altered form of eschac, which goes back through Arabic شاه (šāh) to Persian شاه (šāh, “king”), the word called out in the game when the king is threatened; the game itself came to Europe from India through Persian and Arabic.^[3][1] The final consonant of the French form may owe something to its Old French homonym meaning “booty”, and Guiraud even took the chess word from that noun, which is of Frankish origin, a view the DHLF reports without adopting it.^[6] The figurative sense “setback, failure” arose in French in the 13th century.^[3]

Romanian șah goes back to the same Persian word by another route, and Gabinschi lists the two as etymological doublets.^[7] Negulici in 1848 already called the word Persian and explained it as “king”.^[8] The verb eșua “to fail” is a separate loan, from échouer.^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record, about 1832, is in I. Golescu's Condica, where the word means the game of chess.^[3] Negulici's glossary of 1848 defines it as an oriental game, and MDA2 takes its first record from there.^[8][4]

Semantic evolution

Until late in the 19th century the word meant chess and the check to the king, both now obsolete Gallicisms.^[9][4] Kogălniceanu compared whist with it as the noblest of games, and Eminescu wrote that life is „ca un joc d-eșec” “like a game of chess”.^[9] The phrase a ține pe cineva în eșec “to hold someone in check, to keep someone from acting” is recorded by Costinescu and used by Baronzi and Eminescu.^[9][10]

The sense “failure” is recorded from 1855.^[3] Costinescu in 1870 gives a figurative “heavy loss suffered by a body of troops”, and Șăineanu defines it as a great loss or defeat.^[10][11] Scriban still marked it as a barbarism and offered native equivalents such as a da chix.^[12] Today only “failure, defeat” is current.^[5]

Timeline

• c. 1832 – eșec “chess” in I. Golescu's Condica, the first record.^[3]
• 1848 – Negulici defines it as an oriental game.^[8][4]
• 1855 – first record of the sense “failure”.^[3]
• 1870 – Costinescu records the figurative sense of a military loss and the phrase a ține în eșec.^[10]
• 1880 – „eșecul amicilor săi” “his friends' failure”, quoted in Eminescu's political writings.^[9]

Meanings

Noun

1. failure, defeat: lack of success in an action or undertaking.^[5][13]
2. (obsolete) The game of chess.^[4][9]
3. (obsolete) check: a move that attacks the opponent's king;^[14] a ține pe cineva în eșec “to hold someone in check”.^[4][9]

Related words

• șah
• French échec

References

1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b 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. eșec
3. ^ a b c d e f g h 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. eșec
4. ^ 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, 837
5. ^ a b c DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 362
6. ^ Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
7. ^ Gabinschi, Marcu (2001), Dicționar de dublete etimologice ale limbii române, 2nd ed., Chișinău: Litera, p. 167
8. ^ 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. eșec
9. ^ 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. eșec
10. ^ a b c Costinescu, Ion (1870), Vocabularu romano-francesu, 2 vols., Bucuresci, p. 1, 396
11. ^ Șăineanu, Lazăr (1929), Dicționar universal al limbei române, 6th ed., Craiova: Scrisul Românesc, p. 234
12. ^ Scriban, August (1939), Dicționaru limbii românești (etimologii, înțelesuri, exemple, citațiuni, arhaizme, neologizme, provincializme), Iași: Presa Bună, p. 475
13. ^ Marcu, Florin; Maneca, Constant (1986), Dicționar de neologisme, 3rd ed., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Socialiste România, p. s.v. eșec
14. ^ Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. altundeva