fund

Forms

fund n (plural funduri)^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin fundus (“bottom; landed estate”).^{[2][3][4][5][1]} De Vaan explains the Latin word as a metathesis of Proto-Indo-European *bʰudʰ-n-ó- (“bottom”), and compares Ancient Greek πυθμήν (puthmḗn, “bottom”) and Old English botm (“bottom”).^[6][1]

The noun survives in all four branches: Aromanian fundu, Megleno-Romanian fund and Istro-Romanian fund.^[2][4][7][8] Ciorănescu compares Albanian funt, and its Romance cognates include Italian fondo, Sardinian fundu, French fond, Occitan fons, Spanish hondo and Portuguese fundo.^[2][4][9]

The neologism fond “fund, background, content”, borrowed from French, is a doublet of it.^[2][1] Some older authors, Șincai among them, used the inherited word in that sense too.^[2] The adverb afund “deep down” was formed in Romanian with the prefix a-, and the verbs afunda and înfunda were formed on it.^[2] Pușcariu and Candrea and Densusianu instead derived the verb from Vulgar Latin *affundāre.^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

Tiktin dates the first record to 1428, in the Slavonic–Romanian documents.^[10] A man named Fundea is recorded in 1428.^[11] The Psaltirea Hurmuzaki of the early 16th century has fundul and fundurile “the depths”.^[12][13] MDA2's first record is Ureche's chronicle (1642–1647), which speaks of „vasul cel fără de fund, măcar câtă apă ai turnă într-însul, nu-l mai poți împlea” “the bottomless vessel: however much water you pour into it, you can never fill it”.^[3][5]

Semantic evolution

From the bottom of a vessel the word spread to the bottom of the sea, a well or a valley, and to “the depths” in general.^[5] The 17th-century lexicons use it to render Slavonic бездна “abyss”.^[5][14] It also came to mean the farthest part of a place (fundul grădinii “the end of the garden”) and a place far from any centre (în fundul țării).^[15][16] Figurative uses include fundul inimii “the depths of the heart”.^[15]

Things shaped like the bottom of a vessel are called fund too: a barrel head, the seat of trousers, and the round wooden board on which mămăligă is turned out or vegetables chopped.^[5][3] In familiar speech it means the backside.^[16] The Latin sense “landed estate” survives only as an old regional “land, ground”.^[17][5] In Megleno-Romanian fund also means a winter shelter for cattle, a sense matched by Romanian fundac “shelter in the fields”.^[4] In Maramureș place names fund is the head of a valley.^[18]

Timeline

• 1428 – first record, in a Slavonic–Romanian document, the year of the name Fundea.^[10][11]
• early 16th century – fundul “the depths” in the Psaltirea Hurmuzaki.^[12]
• 1570 – fund in Coresi's psalter.^[19]
• 1642–1647 – „vasul cel fără de fund” “the bottomless vessel” in Ureche's chronicle, MDA2's first record.^[3][5]
• 1649 – Mardarie's lexicon glosses Slavonic бездна “abyss” with it.^[14]
• 1688 – fund, fundul in the Bucharest Bible.^[20]

Meanings

Noun

1. The bottom of a vessel, and what is left there.^[16][3][1]
2. Either of the two flat ends of a barrel or similar container.^[16]
3. A round wooden board on which mămăligă is turned out or vegetables are chopped, a cârpător.^[16][1]
4. (colloquial) The backside, the seat, and of trousers, the seat.^[16][3][1]
5. The lowest, closed part of a natural hollow: the bottom of the sea, a well or a valley, while fund de ochi is the fundus of the eye.^[16]
6. The farthest part of a place, a remote spot far from any centre, the back part of a vehicle.^[16][15]
7. The part of an object opposite its opening: fundul sacului “the bottom of the sack”.^[16]

Word family

• afund
• afunda
• înfunda
• înfundat
• înfundătură
• desfunda
• fundac
• fundaș

Related words

• cufunda
• fundament
• fundație
• scufunda
• fond
• Aromanian fundu
• Latin fundus

Usage notes

A se da la fund is to sink, and figuratively to drop out of public life or lie low.^[16] Sac fără fund “a bottomless sack” is an insatiable person.^[5][10] Fundul fundului is the remotest or deepest spot.^[16]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g 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. fund
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, 952
4. ^ a b c d Pușcariu, Sextil (1905), Etymologisches Wörterbuch der rumänischen Sprache I: Lateinisches Element, Heidelberg: Carl Winter, p. 58
5. ^ a b c d e f g h 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. fund
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. ^ Kovačec, August (1998), Istrorumunjsko-hrvatski rječnik (s gramatikom i tekstovima), Pula
8. ^ Popovici, Iosif (1909), Dialectele romîne din Istria II: texte și glosar, Halle a. S., p. 111
9. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 3585
10. ^ a b c Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. fund
11. ^ a b Constantinescu, N. A. (1963), Dicționar onomastic romînesc, București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. s.v. fund
12. ^ a b 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 41:9
13. ^ 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 64:7
14. ^ a b 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. fund
15. ^ a b c Scriban, August (1939), Dicționaru limbii românești (etimologii, înțelesuri, exemple, citațiuni, arhaizme, neologizme, provincializme), Iași: Presa Bună, p. 1, 533
16. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 419
17. ^ Bulgăr, Gheorghe; Constantinescu-Dobridor, Gheorghe (2002), Dicționar de arhaisme și regionalisme, 2 vols., București: Saeculum Vizual
18. ^ Ștef, Dorin (2021), Dicționar de regionalisme și arhaisme din județul Maramureș, 3rd ed., Baia Mare
19. ^ 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 106:26
20. ^ Biblia, adecă Dumnezeiasca Scriptură a ceii vechi și a ceii noao leage, București, 1688 (ed. 1988, tricentennial edition), p. Facerea 1:2