experiență

Forms

experiență f (plural experiențe)^[1] Older texts have many variants: experienție, esperiență, esperienție, esperiință, isperiință, isperință, speriență, speriință, and regionally esperență.^[2][3] Cantemir writes experienție: „Experienția și dovada din toate zilile ne învață” “experience and the proof of every day teach us”.^[4] Isperință occurs in an old book of instruction: „Aceasta o adeverează și cercarea cea cu sârguință și isperința” “this is confirmed by diligent trial and experience”.^[4]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin experientia, with French expérience and Italian esperienza named beside it by DELR and the DLR;^[2][4] DEX and MDA2 name French and Latin,^[5][3] Tiktin New Latin,^[6] and Wiktionary French.^[1] This noun is formed from Latin experiēns + -ia, the present participle of experior (“to test, try, know by experience”).^[2][7] That verb is formed with ex- on a simple verb that survives only in the participle perītus (“skilled, experienced”), from Proto-Indo-European *per- (“to cross, pass over”); compare Ancient Greek πεῖρα (peîra, “trial, experience”).^[2][8]

Earliest recorded meaning

DELR and Tiktin date the first record to 1705, in Dimitrie Cantemir, in the form experienție.^[2][6] MDA2 cites Cantemir's Hronicul and gives the year of its 1901 edition.^[3]

Semantic evolution

The first sense is the knowledge and skill gained through practice and observation.^[4][2] Texts of 1806–1816 write ecsperienție, esperienție and experiință.^[4] Kogălniceanu reports a proposal to replace the native word ispită, then used in this sense, with esperiență.^[4] The sense of a deliberate test of a hypothesis, an experiment, is recorded beside it, as in French.^[5][2][8] A further sense is an event someone lives through, an adventure.^[2][3] Recent press has the compound experiență-pilot “pilot experiment”, after French expérience-pilote.^[9]

DELR dates the related words experient “experienced” to 1846, experia “to experience” to 1854, both learned loans from Latin, and experiențial to 1924.^[2]

Timeline

• 1705 – experienție in Dimitrie Cantemir, the first record.^[2][6]
• 1806 – esperienție in a text of that year.^[4]
• 1825 – experientia or esperientia in the Lexicon de la Buda, glossed Latin experientia.^[10]
• 1846 – experient “experienced”.^[2]
• 1854 – experia “to experience”.^[2]
• 1924 – experiențial.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. experience: the knowledge and skills people gain directly from contact with the world around them, in practice;^[5][3][1] om cu experiență “an experienced man”.^[5][3][1]
2. A practical test of knowledge by examining phenomena; an experiment;^[5][3] a face o experiență “to make a trial”.^[5][3]
3. Something one lives through, an unusual event or adventure.^[2][3]
4. (obsolete, rare) Research, investigation.^[2][3]

Word family

• experiențial
• inexperiență

Related words

• Latin experientia

Usage notes

MDA2 records schimb de experiență “exchange of experience”, the sharing of skills between people or groups.^[3]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o 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. experiență
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 1, 861
4. ^ a b c d e f g Academia Română (1965–2010), Dicționarul limbii române (DLR), serie nouă, tom I–XIX, București: Editura Academiei Române, p. s.v. experiență
5. ^ a b c d e f DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 371
6. ^ a b c Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. experiență
7. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. s.v. experientia
8. ^ a b Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert, p. s.v. expérience
9. ^ Dimitrescu, Florica (1997), Dicționar de cuvinte recente, 2nd ed., București: Logos (with the 3rd ed., 2013, in CLRE), p. s.v. experiență
10. ^ Lesicon românescu-latinescu-ungurescu-nemțescu quare de mai mulți autori, în cursul a trideci și mai multor ani s-au lucrat (1825), Buda: Typographia Universității (the Lexicon of Buda, ed. Petru Maior et al.), p. 207