foi

Forms

foi (third-person singular present foiește, past participle foit), 4th conjugation^[1]

Etymology

Ciorănescu derives it from Romanian foaie + -i, from the noun for “leaf”, and calls the older derivation from foale “bellows” or from a Latin verb a mistake (against Cihac, Schuchardt, Candrea–Densusianu and the DA, with Graur).^[2] DEX and MDA2 give both views: from Vulgar Latin *folliō (classical folleō) or a derivative of the noun;^[3][4][1] Wiktionary does the same.^[3][4][1] Candrea and Densusianu explain the sense from that of the Latin verb, “to swell and empty like bellows”: the movement to and fro of the bellows became the swarming of a crowd.^[5] The Latin verb is from follis (“bag; bellows”).^[1][6]

Tiktin connects the main senses, “to teem” and the reflexive “to fidget”, with the Romance word for a crowd, Spanish folla and French foule, and the sense “to work the bellows” with the word for bellows.^[7]

Earliest recorded meaning

Tiktin's first record is the Romanian Herodotus translation of 1645.^[7] MDA2 dates the verb from Costache Negruzzi's writings of 1872.^[4]

Semantic evolution

MDA2 puts first the sense “to swell and go down like bellows”, now old and popular, and a rare “to blow into the bellows”;^[4][7] Tiktin quotes a horse whose belly heaves like a Gypsy smith's bellows.^[4][7] The common sense is of a crowd moving to and fro: fish swarming in water like ants in an anthill, people crowding the village streets, and a place full of people.^[7][8]

The reflexive a se foi means “to fidget, to keep moving”, then “to toss and turn” and, figuratively, “to hesitate”.^[3][4] Popular speech also uses it for “to beat”, and in Maramureș the reflexive means “not to find one's place”.^[4][9]

Timeline

• 1645 – the first record, in the Romanian Herodotus.^[7]
• 1872 – in Costache Negruzzi's collected writings.^[4]

Meanings

Verb

1. (intransitive, of a crowd) To swarm, move to and fro, teem: Copiii foiau prin curte.^[3][10]
2. (intransitive, of a place) To be full of people moving about.^[3][4]
3. (reflexive) To fidget, not stay still; to toss and turn looking for a comfortable position;^[3][4] (figurative) to hesitate.^[3][4]
4. (transitive) To make a garment puff out around the body.^[3]

Word family

• foială

Related words

• foale
• înfoia
• foaie

Usage notes

DEX also lists a noun foi (DEX's foi¹), a variant of foale “bellows”, which Scriban gives as the bellows of the smithy and Șăineanu as a plural.^[3][11][12] Foi is also the plural of foaie “leaf, sheet”.^[13]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ 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. foaie
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 404
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 1, 924
5. ^ Candrea, I.-A.; Densusianu, Ov. (1907–1914), Dicționarul etimologic al limbii române: elementele latine (A–Putea), București
6. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
7. ^ a b c d e f Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. foi
8. ^ Macrea, Dimitrie; Petrovici, Emil (coord.) (1955–1957), Dicționarul limbii romîne literare contemporane, 4 vols., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 2, 312
9. ^ Ștef, Dorin (2021), Dicționar de regionalisme și arhaisme din județul Maramureș, 3rd ed., Baia Mare, p. s.v. foí
10. ^ Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2002), Noul dicționar explicativ al limbii române, București: Litera Internațional, p. s.v. foi
11. ^ Scriban, August (1939), Dicționaru limbii românești (etimologii, înțelesuri, exemple, citațiuni, arhaizme, neologizme, provincializme), Iași: Presa Bună, p. 1, 518
12. ^ Șăineanu, Lazăr (1929), Dicționar universal al limbei române, 6th ed., Craiova: Scrisul Românesc, p. 1, 256
13. ^ Antonescu, G. M. (1875), Dictionariu romanu-francesu, Bucuresci: Typografia Curții (Lucrători Associați), p. 106