flirta

Forms

flirta (third-person singular present flirtează, past participle flirtat), 1st conjugation^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from French flirter (“to flirt”).^[2][3][4][1] Marcu and Maneca's dictionary of neologisms compares English flirt.^[5] The French verb is an adaptation, recorded from 1855, of English “to flirt” “to move briskly”, later “to trifle, to court”, a word of obscure, perhaps onomatopoeic, origin.^[6]

The noun flirt was borrowed separately flirt.^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

MDA2's first record is Garabet Ibrăileanu's Spiritul critic în cultura românească, cited from its second edition of 1922.^[3] There it is said of women who had become civilised, spoke French, played the clavichord and „flirtau cu bonjuriștii” “flirted with the Westernised young men”.^[7]

Semantic evolution

The verb means to carry on a light love affair, or a playful conversation with allusions to love, with someone of the opposite sex.^[8][7] The DLRLC of the 1950s labelled it a word of bourgeois jargon.^[7] The noun flirt is recorded from 1946.^[3]

Timeline

• 1922 – flirtau in Ibrăileanu's Spiritul critic, the first record cited.^[3][7]
• 1946 – the noun flirt in Camil Petrescu's plays.^[3]

Meanings

Verb

1. (intransitive) To flirt, to have a flirt with someone: a light, passing love affair or a playful conversation full of allusions: Flirta cu toți colegii.^[2][3][8]

Related words

• flirt
• cocheta
• French flirter

References

1. ^ a b 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. 400
3. ^ a b c d e f Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 1, 917
4. ^ Costăchescu, Adriana; Dincă, Daniela; Dragoste, Ramona; Popescu, Mihaela; Scurtu, Gabriela (2009–2010), Dicționar de împrumuturi lexicale din limba franceză (DILF), 2 vols., Craiova: Universitaria, p. s.v. flirta
5. ^ Marcu, Florin; Maneca, Constant (1986), Dicționar de neologisme, 3rd ed., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Socialiste România, p. s.v. flirta
6. ^ Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
7. ^ a b c d Macrea, Dimitrie; Petrovici, Emil (coord.) (1955–1957), Dicționarul limbii romîne literare contemporane, 4 vols., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 2, 304
8. ^ a b Academia Republicii Populare Romîne (1958), Dicționarul limbii romîne moderne, București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. s.v. flirta