fluiera

Forms

fluiera (third-person singular present fluieră, past participle fluierat, third-person subjunctive fluiere) 1st conjugation^[1] Old texts also conjugate it with -ez: Dosoftei writes „Să vie Filimon să fluieriadze” “let Philemon come and play the pipe”.^[2][3] A regional variant is floiera.^[3][2]

Etymology

It is a denominal verb from Romanian fluier (“shepherd's pipe, whistle”), the view of the Academy dictionaries, Tiktin and DEX.^[4][3][2][5] Ciorănescu turns the relation round: he takes the verb as an expressive creation on the imitative sound sequence ⟨fiu⟩, with an expressive ⟨l⟩ as in flișcui (“to whistle”), and the noun fluier as a back-formation from it.^[6] Wiktionary records the dispute over which came first.^[1]

The noun is obscure, and Ciorănescu rejects the etymons proposed for it, among them Latin fībula, a derivative of flō (“to blow”) and *flaulāre, and Giuglea's Greek one.^[6] Some scholars took it from Albanian fljojere, but Ciorănescu holds that the Albanian word comes from Romanian, as do Modern Greek φλογέρα (flogéra), Serbo-Croatian frula, Czech fujara, Polish fujara and Hungarian furulya.^[6] Cihac had made the Hungarian word the source.^[6] Babiniotis takes the Greek word from Albanian and calls it a Balkan term of unknown further origin, linked with the Romanian one.^[7] The verb has a counterpart in Aromanian fluir, beside the noun fluiarã.^[1][2]

Earliest recorded meaning

Tiktin dates the verb to 1551–1553, in a Gospel passage (Matthew 11:17).^[2] The first quotation with a clear sense is Dosoftei's Lives of the Saints (1682–1686), where it means “to play the pipe”.^[2] MDA2 takes its first record from the same work.^[2][3]

Semantic evolution

From playing the pipe the verb passed to whistling through the lips or through fingers put in the mouth, and to the sound of birds and of the wind.^[4][5] Folk speech shows whistling as a sign of surprise and of regret: a fluiera a pagubă is to whistle over a loss, then to have done something foolish that can no longer be mended.^[2][3] A transitive use, to whistle at a performance or a player in disapproval, is recorded by Șăineanu in 1929 and later by DEX, which adds approval as well.^[8][5] Compounds name idlers and good-for-nothings: fluieră-vânt “a loafer” and fluieră-n-biserică “a worthless man”.^[4][3]

Ciorănescu notes that the sense “shin-bone” of the noun, found all over Romanian, has a parallel in Latin tibia, which meant both “pipe” and “shin-bone”.^[6][9]

Timeline

• 1551–1553 – the first record, in a Gospel passage.^[2]
• 1682–1686 – fluieriadze “may play the pipe” in Dosoftei's Lives of the Saints.^[2][3]
• 1869 – Barițiu gives fluiera for Hungarian füttyent and tilinkáz.^[10][11]
• 1929 – Șăineanu records the sense “to whistle in disapproval”.^[8]

Meanings

Verb

1. To whistle, blowing through the lips or through fingers put in the mouth; of some birds, to make a whistling call.^[5][3]
2. (transitive) To whistle at a performer, a performance or a match in disapproval (or approval).^[5][2]
3. To play the shepherd's pipe.^[5][4]
4. To sound a signal on a whistle.^[5]
5. (of the wind, a storm) To make a loud, shrill noise; to howl.^[5][2]

Word family

• fluierător
• fluierătură
• fluieră-vânt

Related words

• fluier
• șuiera
• Aromanian fluir

Usage notes

A fluiera a pagubă “to whistle over one's loss” means to regret a failure that can no longer be put right.^[3][5] Fluieră-vânt is a loafer.^[5] Tiktin notes that in Moldavia a șuiera is said instead, except in the sense “to play the pipe”.^[2]

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. fluiera
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 1, 920
4. ^ a b c d 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. fluiera
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 402
6. ^ a b c d e 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. fluiera
7. ^ Babiniotis, Georgios (2010), Ετυμολογικό λεξικό της νέας ελληνικής γλώσσας [Etymological Dictionary of Modern Greek], Athens: Κέντρο Λεξικολογίας
8. ^ a b Șăineanu, Lazăr (1929), Dicționar universal al limbei române, 6th ed., Craiova: Scrisul Românesc, p. 255
9. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
10. ^ Barițiu, George (1869), Dictionariu unguresc-romanescu, Brașov, p. 188
11. ^ Barițiu, George (1869), Dictionariu unguresc-romanescu, Brașov, p. 568