gunoi

Forms

gunoi n (plural gunoaie)^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Old Church Slavonic гнои (gnoi, “dung, decay”), as DER, DEX, MDA2 and Tiktin give it.^{[2][3][4][5][1]} In the Slavonic texts the word translates Ancient Greek κόπρος (kópros, “dung”).^[6] DER compares Bulgarian гной (gnoj).^[2]

The Slavonic noun is from Proto-Slavic *gnojь (“pus, manure”), an o-grade formation beside *gniti (“to rot”).^[1][7][8] Its other descendants include Serbo-Croatian гној (gnoj) and Russian гной (gnoj).^[1][9] South of the Danube, Megleno-Romanian gnoi is derived by Capidan from Bulgarian.^[10][11]

DER says, after Candrea, that Hungarian ganaj seems to come from Romanian.^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is gunoiul in the Psaltirea Hurmuzaki of the early 16th century, in Psalm 82 (83), where the Slavonic has гнои “dung”: the enemies “became as dung for the earth”.^[12][5][6] Mardarie's lexicon of 1649 uses gunoaie for Slavonic уметы “sweepings”.^[13]

Semantic evolution

The word covered the dung of animals and the waste swept out of a house: Tiktin glosses it “dung, manure, rubbish, sweepings”, and DER gives “dung, dirt, remains”.^[5][2] The chronicler Muste writes of a famine when people lay fainting „pe gunoaie” “on the dunghills”.^[5] In farming it is stable manure, dung mixed with the straw of the animals' bedding.^[3][4]

From the waste came a speck of dirt that falls on clothes or into the eye: Pann's proverbs, after Matthew 7:3, speak of „gunoiul din ochiul altuia” “the mote in another's eye”.^[5] Figuratively it is a worthless person, gunoiul societății.^[3][14]

Timeline

• c. 1500–1520 – gunoiul in the Psaltirea Hurmuzaki.^[12]
• c. 1573–1578 – in the Psaltirea Scheiană.^[5]
• 1649 – gunoaie in Mardarie's Slavonic–Romanian lexicon.^[13]
• c. 1650–1700 – the verb gunoi “to manure” in the Anonymus Caransebesiensis.^[4][5]
• 1688 – gunoaie in the Bucharest Bible.^[15]

Meanings

Noun

1. (collective, in the singular) rubbish, garbage: dirty or useless remains that are thrown away: Duc gunoiul la tomberon.^[3][4][1]
2. Stable manure: dung mixed with the straw of the animals' bedding, used as organic fertilizer.^[3][4]
3. A speck of straw, fluff or dirt that settles on clothes, falls into a liquid or gets into the eye.^[3][4]
4. (figurative) A worthless person.^[3][4]

Word family

• gunoier
• gunoios
• gunoiște
• îngunoi

Usage notes

DEX lists a separate verb gunoi (gunoiesc), formed on this noun: “to manure the soil”, “(of birds) to foul something with droppings” and, figuratively, “to waste away”; it is first recorded in the Anonymus Caransebesiensis (c. 1650–1700), and DER compares Serbo-Croatian гнојити (gnojiti) and Bulgarian gnojiti.^[3][4][2] Expressions with the noun include a nu face gunoaie la casa cuiva “not to stay long in someone's house”.^[4]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e 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. gunoi
3. ^ a b c d e f g h DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 454
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 1, 1031
5. ^ 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. gunoi
6. ^ a b Kurz, Josef; Hauptová, Zoe (eds.) (1958–1997), Slovník jazyka staroslověnského / Lexicon linguae palaeoslovenicae, 4 vols. + supplements, Praha: Academia; digital ed. gorazd.org
7. ^ Derksen, Rick (2008), Etymological Dictionary of the Slavic Inherited Lexicon, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 4, Leiden / Boston: Brill
8. ^ Georgiev, Vladimir I. et al. (eds.) (1971–), Bălgarski etimologičen rečnik, Sofija: Izdatelstvo na Bălgarskata akademija na naukite, p. 1, 256
9. ^ Vasmer, Max (1964–1973), Ètimologičeskij slovar' russkogo jazyka, transl. and suppl. by O. N. Trubačev, 4 vols., Moskva: Progress
10. ^ Capidan, Theodor (1935), Meglenoromânii III: Dicționar meglenoromân, București: Academia Română, p. 141
11. ^ Saramandu, Nicolae (coord.) et al. (2010–), Dicționarul dialectului meglenoromân, general și etimologic, fascicles in Fonetică și dialectologie XXIX–, p. 204
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 82:9
13. ^ 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. gunoaie
14. ^ Scriban, August (1939), Dicționaru limbii românești (etimologii, înțelesuri, exemple, citațiuni, arhaizme, neologizme, provincializme), Iași: Presa Bună, p. 581
15. ^ Biblia, adecă Dumnezeiasca Scriptură a ceii vechi și a ceii noao leage, București, 1688 (ed. 1988, tricentennial edition), p. Phil 3:8