graniță

Forms

graniță f (plural granițe)^[1] In Moldavia the old chroniclers also wrote hraniță, after the Ukrainian form: Neculce writes „pe marginile țării leșești, pe hraniță” “along the edges of the Polish land, on the border”.^[2][3][4] Beside the plural granițe, MDA2 records an obsolete plural graniți.^[4]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Old Church Slavonic граница (granica) according to MDA2, Tiktin and Wiktionary.^[4][3][1] DEX and DA name Bulgarian граница (granica) and Serbo-Croatian granica instead, and Ciorănescu lists the word as common to the Slavic languages, after Miklosich.^[5][2][6] Tiktin also compares Ukrainian границя (hranycja), the source of the Moldavian form with /h/.^[3][2]

The Slavic word goes back to Proto-Slavic *granica, a derivative of *granь (“edge, border”) with the suffix *-ica.^[7][1] In Old Church Slavonic the word is rare: the SJS records it only in the Gospel of Nicodemus, in the sense “beam”, for the wood of the cross.^[8]

The word is also found south of the Danube: Aromanian graniță, spelled granitsã by Cunia.^[6][9][10]

Earliest recorded meaning

Tiktin's first record is a Moldavian charter of 1632, in the sense “border of a country”.^[3] The 17th-century chronicles use it in this sense: Simion Dascălul tells how Voivode Laski made for the border of Moldavia.^[3] MDA2 dates it from Neculce's chronicle.^[4]

Semantic evolution

Tiktin notes that in the old language hotar was the usual word, and that graniță came to be kept for the line between two states, while hotar is the line between any two properties.^[3] Laurian and Massim's dictionary also used frontieră for it.^[3]

The phrase peste graniță “across the border” came to mean “abroad”, used already in the laws on exile collected in the Uricariul.^[2][5] From the 19th century it is also used figuratively for any limit or edge: Maiorescu wrote of the border of parliamentarism.^[2] Its derivatives are grănicer “border guard” and grăniceresc “of the border guards”.^[6]

Timeline

• 1632 – a Moldavian charter, the first record.^[3]
• 17th–18th centuries – graniță in Simion Dascălul and Nicolae Costin, hraniță in Nicolae Costin, Axinte Uricariul and Neculce.^[2][3]
• 19th century – the figurative sense “limit” in Maiorescu.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. A border, frontier: the line that separates two states: Am trecut granița noaptea.^[5][4][1]
2. peste (or dincolo de) graniță: abroad.^[5]
3. (figurative) A limit, an edge.^[5][2]

Word family

• grănicer
• grăniceresc

Related words

• hotar
• frontieră

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ 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. graniță
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. graniță
4. ^ a b c d e Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 1, 1016
5. ^ a b c d e DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 447
6. ^ 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. graniță
7. ^ Georgiev, Vladimir I. et al. (eds.) (1971–), Bălgarski etimologičen rečnik, Sofija: Izdatelstvo na Bălgarskata akademija na naukite, p. 1, 274
8. ^ Kurz, Josef; Hauptová, Zoe (eds.) (1958–1997), Slovník jazyka staroslověnského / Lexicon linguae palaeoslovenicae, 4 vols. + supplements, Praha: Academia; digital ed. gorazd.org
9. ^ Pascu, Giorge (1925), Dictionnaire étymologique macédoroumain, 2 vols. (I: Les éléments latins et romans; II: Les éléments grecs, turcs, slaves, albanais, germaniques, magyars, néologismes, créations immédiates, obscurs), Iași: Cultura Națională, p. 2, 193
10. ^ Cunia, Tiberius (2008), Dictsiunar a limbãljei armãneascã, Editsii Timpurarã (after T. Papahagi, Ș. Mihăileanu and I. Dalametra; online at dixionline.net), p. 512