folos

Forms

folos n (plural foloase)^[1] The old form fălos is in the Psaltirea Scheiană: „Ce fălosu e în sângele mieu cându deștingu în putredire?” “what profit is there in my blood when I go down to corruption?” (Psalm 29); it was still heard in Mehedinți and the Banat early in the 20th century.^[2][3] Beside the plural foloase the old texts have folosuri: the Codicele Voronețean speaks of „trei folosure” “three benefits”.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Byzantine Greek φελός (felós, “profit, use”), the Byzantine Greek shortening of ὄφελος (óphelos).^{[2][4][3][5][6]} Ciorănescu, DEX and Wiktionary give the source as Modern Greek όφελος (ófelos), which Ciorănescu says was reduced to φέλος (félos) in speech, after Cihac and Pușcariu.^[7][8][1] The record of 1480 favours the older Greek of the Middle Ages over a Phanariote loan.^[4][2]

The Greek noun goes back to Ancient Greek ὄφελος (óphelos, “furtherance, advantage, help”), which Babiniotis connects with the verb ὀφέλλω (ophéllō, “to increase, make prosper”).^[9] Wiktionary traces it to Proto-Indo-European *h₃bʰel- (“to increase, augment”).^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Tiktin dates the first record to 1480, a Romanian word in a Slavonic charter.^[4] In Romanian texts it appears early in the 16th century as fălos in the Psaltirea Hurmuzaki (Psalm 67:13), and as folosure “benefits” in the Codicele Voronețean, MDA2's first record, with the sense of gain or benefit it still has.^[10][3][2]

Semantic evolution

The word has kept the sense of a gain, moral or material, and the dictionaries now set it beside the neologisms beneficiu, profit and avantaj.^[2][8] It is frequent in the old literature: the Bucharest Bible of 1688 has it some seventy times, and the 17th-century Slavonic–Romanian lexicons use it to translate several Slavonic words for use and profit.^[11][12] Klein's dictionary of 1801 renders it with Latin utilitas.^[13] Phrases grew up around it: de folos “useful”, cu folos “profitably”, în folosul cuiva “in someone's interest” and the question ce folos? “what good is it?”.^[8][4] The verb folosi and its derivatives folosință and folositor were formed in Romanian.^[7]

Ciorănescu notes that the word passed from Romanian into Ukrainian (Ruthenian), with the verb as well.^[7]

Timeline

• 1480 – a Romanian word in a Slavonic charter, the first record.^[4]
• early 16th century – fălos in the Psaltirea Hurmuzaki, Psalm 67:13.^[10]
• c. 1563–1583 – folosure in the Codicele Voronețean.^[3][2]
• 1570 – folos in Coresi's psalter, Psalm 67:13.^[10]
• 1688 – about seventy times in the Bucharest Bible.^[11]
• 1801 – in Klein's dictionary, glossed utilitas.^[13]
• 1825 – in the Lexicon de la Buda, with Latin usus, utilitas.^[14]

Meanings

Noun

1. benefit, gain, moral or material; use, profit, advantage: a trage folos din ceva “to profit from something”.^[8][3][1]
2. In phrases: în folosul cuiva “for someone's benefit”, cu folos “to advantage, profitably”, de folos “useful”.^[8][3]
3. Ce folos? “what is the use?”, “to no purpose”.^[8][15]

Word family

• folosi
• folosință
• folositor
• nefolositor

Related words

• Modern Greek όφελος (ófelos)

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g 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. folos
3. ^ a b c d e f g Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 1, 926
4. ^ a b c d e Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. folos
5. ^ Candrea, I.-A.; Adamescu, Gh. (1926–1931), Dicționarul enciclopedic ilustrat „Cartea Românească”, București: Cartea Românească, p. s.v. folos
6. ^ Șăineanu, Lazăr (1929), Dicționar universal al limbei române, 6th ed., Craiova: Scrisul Românesc, p. 256
7. ^ a b c 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. folos
8. ^ a b c d e f DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 404
9. ^ Babiniotis, Georgios (2010), Ετυμολογικό λεξικό της νέας ελληνικής γλώσσας [Etymological Dictionary of Modern Greek], Athens: Κέντρο Λεξικολογίας, p. 1069
10. ^ a b c 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 67:13
11. ^ a b Biblia, adecă Dumnezeiasca Scriptură a ceii vechi și a ceii noao leage, București, 1688 (ed. 1988, tricentennial edition), p. Facerea 37:26
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. folos
13. ^ a b Gáldi, László (ed.) (1944), Samuel Klein: Dictionarium valachico-latinum. Primul dicționar al limbii române, Budapest: Királyi Magyar Pázmány Péter Tudományegyetemi Román Intézet (Klein's dictionary of 1801, with Gáldi's etymological study), p. 361
14. ^ Lesicon românescu-latinescu-ungurescu-nemțescu quare de mai mulți autori, în cursul a trideci și mai multor ani s-au lucrat (1825), Buda: Typographia Universității (the Lexicon of Buda, ed. Petru Maior et al.), p. 223
15. ^ Academia Republicii Populare Romîne (1958), Dicționarul limbii romîne moderne, București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. s.v. folos