fereca

Forms

fereca (third-person singular present ferecă, past participle ferecat, third-person subjunctive ferece) 1st conjugation^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin fabricō (“to fashion, forge”), a verb made from fabrica (“workshop, craft”), a derivative of faber (“craftsman, smith”).^{[2][3][4][5][1][6][7]} Ciorănescu follows Candrea and Densusianu, the REW, Capidan and the DA, and finds the sense development natural, since the Latin verb first meant working iron.^[2][8] Candrea and Densusianu explain the form: the regular ⟨*făureca⟩ became făreca by the reduction of unstressed /ău/ to /ă/, and then fereca by assimilation.^[9]

The word was drawn towards fier “iron” by folk etymology, and the DA thinks this decided its later senses;^[10][3][4] DEX and MDA2 also note the influence.^[10][3][4] Meyer and Pușcariu preferred Vulgar Latin *ferricō from ferrum (“iron”), compared with Old French enfergier;^[2][5][1] Tiktin rejects it.^[2][5][1]

The verb survives south of the Danube: Aromanian fãric “to shoe a horse” and Megleno-Romanian firicari.^[2][1] Its Romance cognates include Italian fabbricare, Occitan fabregar, French forger, Spanish fraguar and Portuguese fragoar.^[9] Romanian fabrica is a learned doublet.^[10][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is in the Codicele Voronețean (c. 1563–1583), where Candrea and Densusianu find the noun fărecare “trick, snare”, close to the Latin sense “to contrive”.^[4][9] The Psaltirea Scheiană uses the participle fărecat for a prisoner in chains.^[9]

Semantic evolution

The DA takes “to forge” as the first sense;^[10] Megleno-Romanian and Albanian farkon kept the sense “to shoe a horse”.^[10] In Romanian, once the word was linked with fier, it came to mean binding wood or stone with iron, as wheels are bound with tyres, and putting people in irons: Neculce writes of a hetman sent off ferecat în obezi “fettered in stocks”.^[10][2] Covering an icon or a book with plates of silver or gold is a further sense, the one closest to the Latin goldsmith's work.^[10][3]

Technical uses followed: paving a road with gravel, dressing a millstone with a hammer so that it grinds well, milling the edge of a coin.^[10][4] From “to bar with iron” came “to lock, bolt a door”, and the reflexive “to shut oneself up at home”.^[3] The saying Faur ferecă și desferecă “February binds and unbinds” plays on the link with faur¹ and the frosts and thaws of the month.^[10]

Timeline

• c. 1563–1583 – fărecare “snare” in the Codicele Voronețean, the first record.^[4][9]
• 1570 – the participle ferecați in Coresi's Psalter (Ps 106:10).^[11]
• c. 1573–1578 – fărecat “prisoner in chains” in the Psaltirea Scheiană.^[9]
• c. 1660–1670 – ferecat glossing Slavonic “plated with silver” in a Slavonic–Romanian lexicon.^[12]
• 1688 – ferecat and ferecați in the Bucharest Bible.^[13]

Meanings

Verb

1. To cover a wooden object wholly or partly with metal or bind it with metal bands to make it strong; to hoop.^[3][4][1]
2. To adorn an object, especially an icon, with plates of precious metal or with jewels.^[3][4]
3. To put a person in irons or chains; to fetter, to shackle.^[3][1]
4. To lock or bolt a door or a room;^[3][4] (reflexive) to shut oneself up at home and see no one.^[3][4]
5. To dress a millstone with a hammer, cutting grooves in it; to mill the edge of a coin.^[3][4]

Word family

• ferecătură
• desfereca
• înfereca

Related words

• fabrica
• făuri
• faur
• Aromanian fãric
• Latin fabricō

Usage notes

Variants are înfereca, înferica and făreca.^[2][4] MDA2 also lists a separate, obsolete fereca as a variant of ferica “to make happy”.^[4]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g 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. fereca
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 388
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 1, 894
5. ^ 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. fereca
6. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
7. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
8. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 3294
9. ^ a b c d e f Candrea, I.-A.; Densusianu, Ov. (1907–1914), Dicționarul etimologic al limbii române: elementele latine (A–Putea), București, p. s.v. fereca
10. ^ a b c d e f g h i 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. fereca
11. ^ 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 106:10
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. s.v. ferecat
13. ^ Biblia, adecă Dumnezeiasca Scriptură a ceii vechi și a ceii noao leage, București, 1688 (ed. 1988, tricentennial edition), p. Ieșirea 27:17