grav

Forms

grav m or n (feminine singular gravă, masculine plural gravi, feminine/neuter plural grave)^[1] MDA2 records an old variant grave;^[2][3] Costinescu's dictionary of 1870 spells it gravŭ, glossed “heavy, oppressive”.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is borrowed from French grave and directly borrowed from Latin gravis (“heavy, weighty”), the two sources DEX, MDA2 and Marcu name.^[4][2][5] Marcu & Maneca add Italian grave, and Tiktin and Scriban give only the Latin.^[6][7][8] The same Latin adjective, in a form Vulgar Latin *grevis reshaped after levis (“light”), gave the inherited greu, so that the two are doublets.^[9][10][1]

The Latin adjective goes back to Proto-Indo-European *gʷreh₂-u- (“heavy”), a u-stem adjective remade as an i-stem in Latin; it is related to Ancient Greek βαρύς (barús, “heavy”).^[11][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Tiktin dates the first record to 1836, in Constantin Negruzzi, and glosses the word “difficult, earnest, weighty, deep”.^[7] Negulici's dictionary of 1848 explains it as “heavy” and as said of someone who speaks with deliberation and dignity.^[12]

Semantic evolution

The physical sense “heavy” of the Latin and French words appears only in Costinescu's corpurile grave “heavy bodies”.^[3] The moral senses, “serious, solemn” of people and “important, having bad consequences” of things, are the ones the dictionaries put first, and of illness or wounds it means “dangerous”.^[4][8][13] In music it is said of low notes and voices, and grammar has the accent grav, the grave accent, used in the old Romanian spelling for stressed final vowels.^[2][13] As an adverb it means “seriously, badly”: grav rănit “seriously wounded”.^[14]

Timeline

• 1836 – the first record, in Constantin Negruzzi.^[7]
• 1848 – in Negulici's dictionary of neologisms.^[12]
• 1870 – gravŭ in Costinescu, with the physical sense “heavy”.^[3]
• 1886 – Barcianu glosses it German “ernst, wichtig” and records accent grav.^[15]

Meanings

Adjective

1. serious, grave: very important because of its unpleasant consequences, liable to have bad results: o greșeală gravă.^[4][1]
2. (of illness or wounds) Dangerous, primejdios, possibly fatal.^[4]
3. (of people, their look or manner) Very serious, stern; solemn.^[4][1]
4. (of voices, sounds, tones) In the lowest register; deep, low.^[4]
5. (grammar) In accent grav: the grave accent, a mark slanting from left to right, used in some languages on an open vowel.^[4][2]

Adverb

1. gravely, seriously, badly: a fi grav bolnav.^[14][1]

Related words

• gravita
• gravitate
• greu
• gravidă
• Latin gravis

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ 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, 1017
3. ^ a b c d Costinescu, Ion (1870), Vocabularu romano-francesu, 2 vols., Bucuresci, p. 1, 499
4. ^ a b c d e f g DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 447
5. ^ Marcu, Florin (2000), Marele dicționar de neologisme, București: Saeculum Vizual, p. s.v. grav
6. ^ Marcu, Florin; Maneca, Constant (1986), Dicționar de neologisme, 3rd ed., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Socialiste România, p. s.v. grav
7. ^ 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. grav
8. ^ a b Scriban, August (1939), Dicționaru limbii românești (etimologii, înțelesuri, exemple, citațiuni, arhaizme, neologizme, provincializme), Iași: Presa Bună, p. 573
9. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
10. ^ Gabinschi, Marcu (2001), Dicționar de dublete etimologice ale limbii române, 2nd ed., Chișinău: Litera, p. 110
11. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
12. ^ a b Negulici, I. D. (1848), Vocabular romînesc de toate vorbele streine întroduse pînă acum în limba romînească și de toate cuvintele ce s-ar mai putea introduce încă, București, p. s.v. grav
13. ^ a b Șăineanu, Lazăr (1929), Dicționar universal al limbei române, 6th ed., Craiova: Scrisul Românesc, p. 1, 282
14. ^ a b Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2002), Noul dicționar explicativ al limbii române, București: Litera Internațional, p. s.v. grav
15. ^ Barcianu, Sava Popovici (1886), Dicționar român-germân și germân-român, revised by D. P. Barcianu, part I: român-germân, Sibiu: Institut tipografic, p. 258