geantă

Forms

geantă f (plural genți)^[1] The old plural was gente or geante, besides modern genți.^[2][3] Tiktin gives the diminutives gentuță and gentuliță;^[4][5] DA has gentiță.^[4][5]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Ottoman Turkish چانطه (çanta, “leather bag, small suitcase”), a word of the Ottoman period.^{[6][2][4][7][5][1]} The Ottoman word spread through the Balkans: Ciorănescu compares Modern Greek τσάντα (tsánta) and Bulgarian чанта (čanta), with Aromanian ceantã south of the Danube.^[6][8][9] Doerfer argued the reverse direction, that Turkish çanta was borrowed from Romanian;^[10][11] Tietze rejects this, following Papahagi.^[10][11] The further origin of the Turkish word is unclear: Nişanyan suggests, without certainty, a Persian source.^[12]

Earliest recorded meaning

Tiktin's first record is a document of 1741 published by Iorga.^[4] MDA2 and DA cite a document of 1790, quoted by Șăineanu, with „o geantă de șa turcească” “a Turkish saddle bag”.^[2][5]

Semantic evolution

The old geantă was a large leather pouch hung round the neck or from the saddle, carried by hunters and couriers: Filimon has a courier with „o geantă cu scrisori atârnată de gât” “a bag of letters hung round his neck”.^[5][4][3] Soldiers carried their cartridges in one, so the word also meant a cartușieră; that sense is obsolete.^[5][2] In Moldavia tașcă was the usual word, and Scriban records geantă there for a school satchel.^[4][3] The modern senses are a bag for documents and books, a briefcase, and a woman's handbag.^[7][2]

Timeline

• 1741 – first record, in a document published by Iorga.^[4]
• 1790 – o geantă de șa turcească in a document.^[2][5]
• 19th century – the sense “cartridge pouch” in Kogălniceanu's chronicle edition and Odobescu.^[5]
• 1939 – Scriban records the Moldavian sense “school satchel”.^[3]

Meanings

Noun

1. A bag of leather, cloth or plastic, usually rectangular, with one or more compartments, for carrying papers, books or notebooks; a servietă;^[7][2][1] Și-a pus laptopul în geantă. “She put her laptop in her bag.”^[7][2][1]
2. A handbag, a poșetă.^[7][2]
3. (obsolete) A cartridge pouch.^[2][5]

Related words

• tașcă
• Aromanian ceantã

Usage notes

A separate geantă, the variant of jantă “wheel rim”, is jante influenced by this word;^[6][2] Ciorănescu records the slang phrase a fi pe geantă “to be in the lead”.^[6][2]

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 k l Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 1, 980
3. ^ a b c d Scriban, August (1939), Dicționaru limbii românești (etimologii, înțelesuri, exemple, citațiuni, arhaizme, neologizme, provincializme), Iași: Presa Bună, p. 547
4. ^ 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. geántă
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i 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. geantă
6. ^ a b c d 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. geantă
7. ^ a b c d e DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 431
8. ^ Papahagi, Tache (1963), Dicționarul dialectului aromân, general și etimologic, București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 350
9. ^ Cunia, Tiberius (2008), Dictsiunar a limbãljei armãneascã, Editsii Timpurarã (after T. Papahagi, Ș. Mihăileanu and I. Dalametra; online at dixionline.net), p. 279
10. ^ a b Eren, Hasan (1999), Türk Dilinin Etimolojik Sözlüğü, Ankara: Bizim Büro, p. 78
11. ^ a b Tietze, Andreas (2002–2018), Tarihi ve Etimolojik Türkiye Türkçesi Lugatı, Istanbul: Simurg; Vienna: Austrian Academy of Sciences, p. 147
12. ^ Nişanyan, Sevan, Nişanyan Sözlük: Çağdaş Türkçenin Etimolojisi (online edition), p. s.v. çanta