frunte

Forms

frunte f (plural frunți)^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin frontem (“forehead”).^{[2][3][1][4][5][6]} The word survives in all four branches: Aromanian frãmte, Megleno-Romanian frînte and Istro-Romanian frunte.^[2][7][8][9] Its Romance cognates include Italian fronte, Occitan front, Catalan front, Spanish frente and Portuguese fronte.^[2][5] The neologism front is a doublet.^[2][4] For the Latin word, de Vaan finds no plausible etymology.^[10][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Tiktin's first record is a Slavonic–Romanian document of 1490.^[11] MDA2 dates the word to Dosoftei's lives of the saints, printed in 1682–1686.^[3] The sense was the forehead.^[3]

Semantic evolution

From the forehead the word passed to the front part of anything and to the top of it.^[3][12] In the old chronicles it named the front line of an army: Miron Costin writes that the Moldavians too stood in the van, „au stătut frunte și moldovenii”.^[11][3] The figurative sense “the best, the elite” is old too: a chronicle speaks of the boyars who were „mai frunte” “the foremost”, and later writers of fruntea satului “the leading people of the village”.^[11] The phrases de frunte “first-rate” and în frunte “at the head” come from it.^[12][11] In distilling, the word names the first fraction to come over.^[12]

Romanian formed fruntaș “leading man” and înfrunta “to defy”, recorded from the 17th century;^[2] Candrea–Densusianu and the DA take the verb from Vulgar Latin *infrontō, which Ciorănescu finds unlikely.^[2] fruntarie “frontier” was modelled on French frontière, and sfruntat “impudent” on French effronté.^[2]

Timeline

• 1490 – in a Slavonic–Romanian document.^[11]
• 17th century – the verb înfrunta.^[2]
• 1682–1686 – in Dosoftei's lives of the saints.^[3]
• 1825 – the Lexicon de la Buda gives the forehead, the front part of a thing and “the choicest part”.^[13]

Meanings

Noun

1. The forehead, the upper part of the face between the eyebrows and the hair; of animals, the front of the head above the eyes.^[12][1]
2. The head, the face.^[12]
3. (figurative, often with the article) The best, choicest part of something; a person who stands out among others, the elite.^[12] De frunte means first-rate, leading.^[12][14]
4. În frunte, în fruntea: at the head of, in front of; in the first place.^[12]
5. (popular) The front or the top of a thing.^[3]
6. (Transylvania) The beam above the front of the hearth that holds up the chimney.^[3]
7. The first fraction of a distillation.^[12]

Word family

• fruntar
• fruntășie
• fruntășime
• înfrunta
• înfruntător
• înfrunți
• fruntaș

Related words

• front
• Aromanian frãmte
• Latin frons

Usage notes

The proverb ce ți-e scris, în frunte ți-e pus “what is written for you is set on your forehead” means that no one escapes his fate.^[11][4] Banat has a dialect form fruncea.^[11][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 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. frunte
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, 947
4. ^ a b c 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. frunte
5. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 3533
6. ^ Candrea, I.-A.; Densusianu, Ov. (1907–1914), Dicționarul etimologic al limbii române: elementele latine (A–Putea), București, p. 116
7. ^ Papahagi, Tache (1963), Dicționarul dialectului aromân, general și etimologic, București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 471
8. ^ Kovačec, August (1998), Istrorumunjsko-hrvatski rječnik (s gramatikom i tekstovima), Pula, p. s.v. frunte
9. ^ Popovici, Iosif (1909), Dialectele romîne din Istria II: texte și glosar, Halle a. S., p. 111
10. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill, p. s.v. frōns
11. ^ a b c d e f g Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. frunte
12. ^ 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. 416
13. ^ 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. 227
14. ^ Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2002), Noul dicționar explicativ al limbii române, București: Litera Internațional, p. s.v. frunte