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fiertură

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Etymology and origin of the Romanian word fiertură

Confidence
Established
Formation
Derivation
First attested
1649 Mardarie's Slavonic–Romanian lexicon More words from the 17th century
Ultimate origin
Latin ferveō

Forms

fiertură f (plural fierturi)[1]

Etymology

It is formed from Romanian fiert + -ură, from the past participle of fierbe “to boil”.[2][3][4][5] Wiktionary also allows *fertura, a contraction of a participial noun formed on Latin ferveō (“to boil”).[1] The same word is Aromanian hirturã.[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is in Mardarie's Slavonic–Romanian lexicon of 1649, where it glosses Old Church Slavonic варение (varenije) “boiling, cooking”; the other 17th-century lexicons repeat it.[7][5] MDA2 cites Dosoftei's lives of the saints (1682–1686), where the form is hertură, a cooked dish.[3][4]

Semantic evolution

The concrete sense, a food or drink made by boiling, has been the main one from the start; the abstract “boiling” is rare.[4][3] The Bucharest Bible of 1688 uses it for the pottage for which Esau sold his birthright.[8] In the countryside it became the general name of dishes of boiled vegetables, every cooked dish except mămăligă, and in places it means soup or ciorbă.[5][4][3] In Argeș it is a warm broth, especially a chicken soup.[9] The phrase a băga pe cineva în fierturi means to frighten someone badly.[4][3] It pairs with friptură “roast” and coptură “baked dish”.[4]

Timeline

  • 1649 – the first record, in Mardarie's lexicon.[7][5]
  • 1682 – hertură in Dosoftei's lives of the saints.[3][4]
  • 1688 – the pottage of Esau in the Bucharest Bible.[8]

Meanings

Noun

  1. A dish or drink made by boiling; a decoction.[2][10][1]
  2. (regional) A broth or soup; ciorbă.[3][9]
  3. Boiling, clocot.[2][3]

Usage notes

The DA records a diminutive fierturică.[4]

References

  1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 392
  3. ^ 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, 902
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h 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. fiertură
  5. ^ 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. fiertură
  6. ^ Papahagi, Tache (1963), Dicționarul dialectului aromân, general și etimologic, București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 558
  7. ^ a b 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. fiertură
  8. ^ a b Biblia, adecă Dumnezeiasca Scriptură a ceii vechi și a ceii noao leage, București, 1688 (ed. 1988, tricentennial edition), p. Gen 25:29
  9. ^ a b Constantinescu, Grigore; Constantinescu, Eugenia (2014), Glosar. Arealul etnocultural Argeș-Muscel, p. 45
  10. ^ Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2002), Noul dicționar explicativ al limbii române, București: Litera Internațional, p. s.v. fiertură
Cite this entry

“Fiertură.” Etymologically, 11 Nov. 2026, etymologically.com/ro/fiertur%C4%83. Accessed 12 Nov. 2026.

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