găleată

Forms

găleată f (plural găleți)^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Late Latin galleta (“bucket”), a Late Latin word recorded in a glossary.^{[2][3][4][5][6][1]} Wiktionary takes it as a diminutive of a Vulgar Latin *galla (“vessel”), perhaps of Gaulish origin, but Pușcariu and the REW call its origin obscure.^[1][5][6] Ciorănescu rejects Philippide's derivation from Latin calathus (“basket”).^[2]

It survives south of the Danube: Aromanian gãleatã and Megleno-Romanian găletă.^[2][7][8] The Latin word lives on in Albanian galetë, Italian galletta (“wine vessel”), Catalan galleda and Old French jaloie.^[2][5][1] It also spread outside Romance: Pușcariu lists Middle High German gelte, Slovak geleta and Polish gieleta.^[5]

Cihac took the Romanian word from the Slavic and Hungarian forms, but Ciorănescu rejects this.^[2] The Hungarian dictionaries take galeta, recorded from 1610, from Romanian and Slovak, as a word of the Vlach shepherds of the Carpathians.^[9][10]

Earliest recorded meaning

Tiktin's first record is of 1519, from the Romanian words in the Slavonic charters.^[4] MDA2 dates the word from the Anonymus Caransebesiensis, a Romanian–Latin glossary of about 1650–1700.^[3] Mardarie's lexicon of 1649 has it too.^[11]

Semantic evolution

The bucket was first a wooden vessel made of staves, for drawing water from the well, for watering horses and for milking sheep and goats.^[4][12] It became a measure of capacity, which varied by product and region: 12 oca of milk, 5 oca of cheese at Brașov, and about 80 litres of grain.^[2][3][12] Klein's dictionary of 1801 defines it as four ferdele.^[13]

From the grain measure came a tax on cereals, introduced by Prince Mihnea: Ciorănescu dates it to 1585, Scriban and the CADE to 1577.^[2][12][14] A chronicle says of a prince that he „au adus în țară găleata” “brought the bucket-tax into the country”.^[15] Chronicles of the 18th century also count gifts in buckets, „doao mii de găleți de galbeni” “two thousand buckets of gold coins”.^[15]

The word also names a wedding dance that young people dance around a bucket of water decorated with a kerchief, at the bride's house.^[3][4] Thieves' slang uses it for a pocket.^[2][16]

Timeline

• 1519 – first record, in a Slavonic charter.^[4]
• 1577 or 1585 – the cereal tax introduced by Prince Mihnea.^[2][12]
• 1649 – găleată in Mardarie's Slavonic–Romanian lexicon.^[11]
• c. 1650–1700 – in the Anonymus Caransebesiensis glossary.^[3]
• 1801 – a measure of four ferdele in Klein's dictionary.^[13]
• 1825 – a measure, a water bucket and a milking pail in the Lexicon de la Buda.^[17]

Meanings

Noun

1. A bucket or pail of wood, metal or plastic, for carrying liquids or loose materials, and its contents.^[18][3][1]
2. An old measure of capacity for milk, cheese or grain, which varied by period and region.^[18][3]
3. (historical) A tithe on grain collected in the Romanian principalities.^[18][3]
4. A wedding dance performed around a bucket of water.^[3]
5. (slang) A pocket.^[2][16]

Word family

• găletar

Usage notes

A ploua cu găleata, “to rain by the bucket”, means to pour with rain.^[18][3]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j 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. găleată
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 1, 971
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. găleată
5. ^ a b c d Pușcariu, Sextil (1905), Etymologisches Wörterbuch der rumänischen Sprache I: Lateinisches Element, Heidelberg: Carl Winter, p. 60
6. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 3656
7. ^ Papahagi, Tache (1963), Dicționarul dialectului aromân, general și etimologic, București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 490
8. ^ Saramandu, Nicolae (coord.) et al. (2010–), Dicționarul dialectului meglenoromân, general și etimologic, fascicles in Fonetică și dialectologie XXIX–, p. 187
9. ^ Benkő, Loránd (ed.) (1967–1976), A magyar nyelv történeti-etimológiai szótára, 3 vols., Budapest: Akadémiai Kiadó, p. 1, 1018
10. ^ Gerstner, Károly (ed.) (2006–), Új magyar etimológiai szótár, Budapest: Nyelvtudományi Kutatóközpont; online at uesz.nytud.hu
11. ^ 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. găleată
12. ^ a b c d Scriban, August (1939), Dicționaru limbii românești (etimologii, înțelesuri, exemple, citațiuni, arhaizme, neologizme, provincializme), Iași: Presa Bună, p. 544
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. 365
14. ^ Candrea, I.-A.; Adamescu, Gh. (1926–1931), Dicționarul enciclopedic ilustrat „Cartea Românească”, București: Cartea Românească, p. s.v. găleată
15. ^ a b Costinescu, Mariana; Georgescu, Magdalena; Zgraon, Florentina (1987), Dicționarul limbii române literare vechi (1640–1780): termeni regionali, București: Editura Științifică și Enciclopedică, p. 133
16. ^ a b Volceanov, George (2007), Dicționar de argou al limbii române, București: Niculescu, p. s.v. găleată
17. ^ 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. 233
18. ^ a b c d DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 429