fecioară

Forms

fecioară f (plural fecioare)^[1] Older and colloquial texts have ficioară: „Pururea ficioară Maria” “Mary, ever virgin” (a Molitvelnic of 1669).^[2][3][4]

Etymology

It is probably inherited from Vulgar Latin *fētiola, a diminutive of Latin fēta (“female that has just given birth”), from fētus.^{[3][5][6][4][1][7]} DEX also allows a formation from Romanian fată + -ioară, and Scriban gave both explanations.^[6][8] Ciorănescu lists it among the derivatives of fecior, which he too derives within Romanian, from făt, rather than from Latin.^[9] Istro-Romanian has the cognate fețǫre.^[9][5] Aromanian uses other words for a virgin.^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is the plural fecioarele in Psalm 143:14 of the Psaltirea Hurmuzaki, in the early 16th century.^[10] Tiktin's first record is a Gospel book of 1551–1553, at Matthew 9.^[3] MDA2 starts from Moxa's chronicle (1620), where Heraclius dedicates the city to the Virgin, the Mother of God.^[4][2]

Semantic evolution

The word has meant “virgin, maiden” since its first records, and the Church language used it for the Virgin Mary: Pururea fecioara Maria “Mary, ever virgin”.^[3][2] Old writers and folk poetry often put it beside fată: fete fecioare “maidens” occurs in Ureche and Neculce, and in folk songs.^[2] This use gave the adjective, fată fecioară “marriageable girl”.^[6] Poets extended the adjective to pure, untouched things: Eminescu speaks of the moon's „lumina ta fecioară” “your virgin light”.^[3][2]

Klein's dictionary of 1801 already has Fecioara for the zodiac sign Virgo.^[11] The plant name iarba fecioarei, for rupturewort (Herniaria glabra), is also old.^[3][4]

Timeline

• c. 1500–1520 – fecioarele “maidens” in the Psaltirea Hurmuzaki.^[10]
• 1551–1553 – in a Gospel book, Tiktin's first record.^[3]
• 1620 – the Virgin Mary, in Moxa's chronicle.^[4][2]
• c. 1660 – in the Slavonic–Romanian lexicons, glossing Slavonic words for “virgin”.^[12]
• 1669 – ficioară in a Molitvelnic.^[2]
• 1688 – 33 times in the Bucharest Bible.^[13]
• 1801 – Fecioara “Virgo” in Klein's dictionary.^[11]

Meanings

Noun

1. A virgin: a young woman who has never had sexual relations.^[6][4][1]
2. Fecioara (Christianity): the Virgin Mary, the Mother of God.^[6]
3. Fecioara (astronomy): the zodiac constellation Virgo, in which the Sun stands at the autumn equinox; also the sign of the zodiac.^[6]
4. (botany) Iarba fecioarei: rupturewort (Herniaria glabra), also called feciorică.^[4][3]

Adjective

1. (popular) In fată fecioară: a girl of marriageable age.^[6]
2. (figurative) Pure, untouched.^[6][1]

Related words

• fecior
• feciorelnic
• fată
• făt
• Istro-Romanian fețǫre

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g Academia Română (1913–1949), Dicționarul limbii române (DA), ed. Sextil Pușcariu, tom I (A–B, C, D–De) and tom II (F–I, J–Lojniță), București: Socec / Universul / Monitorul Oficial și Imprimeriile Statului; page scans at cflr-scans.solirom.ro, p. s.v. fecioară
3. ^ a b c d e f g h Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. fecioară
4. ^ 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, 890
5. ^ a b c Pușcariu, Sextil (1905), Etymologisches Wörterbuch der rumänischen Sprache I: Lateinisches Element, Heidelberg: Carl Winter, p. 51
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. 386
7. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ Scriban, August (1939), Dicționaru limbii românești (etimologii, înțelesuri, exemple, citațiuni, arhaizme, neologizme, provincializme), Iași: Presa Bună, p. 498
9. ^ 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. fecior
10. ^ 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 143:14
11. ^ a b Gáldi, László (ed.) (1944), Samuel Klein: Dictionarium valachico-latinum. Primul dicționar al limbii române, Budapest: Királyi Magyar Pázmány Péter Tudományegyetemi Román Intézet (Klein's dictionary of 1801, with Gáldi's etymological study), p. 359
12. ^ 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. fecioară
13. ^ Biblia, adecă Dumnezeiasca Scriptură a ceii vechi și a ceii noao leage, București, 1688 (ed. 1988, tricentennial edition), p. Genesis 24:16