existență

Forms

existență f (plural existențe)^[1] In the first record the word has the old form existenție, still in Teodori in 1825: „numai legăturii aceștia poate el mulțemi pentru ființa sau existenția sa” “only to this bond can he owe his being or existence”.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is borrowed from French existence, with Latin existentia, the learned Latin noun, as a second model;^{[2][3][4][5][6]} DELR and DLR also name Italian esistenza, and Tiktin and MDA2 give French and Latin.^{[2][3][4][5][6]} Wiktionary gives French alone.^[1] The Latin noun is formed on existēns, the present participle of existō (“to rise, appear; to exist”).^[2][7]

The verb exista came from the same French and Latin models.^[7]

Earliest recorded meaning

DELR dates the first record to 1818, as existenție in Budai-Deleanu's lexicon.^[2] Tiktin and MDA2 date it to 1825, in Teodori's account of man published in a calendar, where it means the being or life of man.^[4][5][3]

Semantic evolution

For several decades the word had many shapes: DELR lists existenție, ecsistență, esistență, esistință, existință, ezistență, ezistenție and ezistință.^[2] Besides the fact of being and life, it took on the sense of the means of living, a person's livelihood, and became a term of philosophy for everything that exists independently of thought.^[6][8][9]

Its family followed the French models: coexistență is recorded from about 1832, inexistență from 1848, neexistență from 1861 and existențial from 1886.^[2]

Timeline

• 1818 – existenție in Budai-Deleanu's lexicon, the first record.^[2]
• 1825 – existenție in Teodori.^[4][5]
• c. 1832 – coexistență.^[2]
• 1848 – inexistență, as inesistință, in Negulici's vocabulary.^[2]
• 1886 – existențial.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. The fact of existing, of being real;^[6][5] (philosophy) the category for nature, matter and all that exists independently of consciousness.^[6][5]
2. life considered in its length and content; the duration of a situation or institution.^[6][5]
3. The material means needed to live, a livelihood; a way of life.^[6]

Related words

• exista
• existent
• existențial
• coexistență
• inexistență
• French existence

Usage notes

The ⟨x⟩ is pronounced /gz/: eg-zis-.^[6][5]

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k 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. existență
3. ^ a b c d Academia Română (1965–2010), Dicționarul limbii române (DLR), serie nouă, tom I–XIX, București: Editura Academiei Române, p. s.v. existență
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. existență
5. ^ 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, 857
6. ^ a b c d e f g h DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 1, 370
7. ^ a b 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. exista
8. ^ Marcu, Florin; Maneca, Constant (1986), Dicționar de neologisme, 3rd ed., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Socialiste România, p. s.v. existență
9. ^ Marcu, Florin (2000), Marele dicționar de neologisme, București: Saeculum Vizual, p. s.v. existență