iute

Forms

iute m or f or n (plural iuți)^[1] MDA2 records the variants iut and the feminine iută, with the plural iuți.^[2] Among the Romanians of Bulgaria the DA records ut and the feminine ută, taken from Bulgarian ljut.^[3]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Old Church Slavonic лютъ (ljutŭ, “fierce, violent, cruel”), from Proto-Slavic *ľutъ.^[4][2][5][1] In Old Church Slavonic the adjective meant “violent, cruel, terrible, wicked” and glossed Greek words for “harsh”, “bitter” and “sharp”.^[6] Its relatives in the other Slavic languages include Bulgarian лют (ljut) “hot, sharp; angry”, Serbo-Croatian ljut “bitter, sharp, angry”, Polish luty “fierce” and Russian лютый (ljútyj) “ferocious, cruel”;^[4][7][8][9] Ciorănescu notes that they share the Romanian senses.^[4][7][8][9] The Proto-Slavic word has no certain relatives outside Slavic;^[9] Vasmer reports comparisons with Welsh llid (“anger”).^[9] Megleno-Romanian l'ut has the same origin.^[4]

The 19th-century Latinists gave it a Latin origin: Laurian & Massim derived it from Latin eunte (“going”), and the Lexicon of Buda from leviter (“lightly”) with /l/ turned into /j/; these are period views only.^[10][11]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is in the Psaltirea Hurmuzaki of the early 16th century, at Psalm 33:21.^[12] The Psaltirea Scheiană (c. 1573–1578) has în zi iute “in the evil day” for Slavonic vŭ denĭ ljutŭ (Psalm 48:5), and MDA2 takes its first record from the same psalter.^[13][2] In the old texts it means “violent, harsh, grim”, of pain, of a bad time or of a person.^[13][3]

Semantic evolution

The old meaning “violent, severe, cruel” is the Slavonic one: Coresi speaks of a sore that is bad and iute, and old texts of iuți dureri “violent pains” and of a drac iute “a fierce devil”.^[3][13] From the sharpness of pain the word passed to taste and smell: pepper, mustard, horseradish and strong vinegar, lye or brandy are iuți, and an acrid smoke has a miros iute.^[3][2] Of people it came to mean quick-tempered, iute la mânie or iute de fire.^[13][2]

The sense “quick, fast”, today the main one, is the DA's third group of senses, which it says developed on Romanian ground, without a match in Slavic.^[3] Its quotations for it come from the 19th century: Konaki, Anton Pann, Alecsandri and Creangă.^[3] Used as an adverb, iute means “quickly, at once”.^[5][14] The 17th-century Slavonic–Romanian lexicons already use it to gloss words for “swift” and “bitter” as well as “fierce”.^[15]

Timeline

• c. 1500–1520 – iute in the Psaltirea Hurmuzaki, the first record.^[12]
• c. 1573–1578 – în zi iute “in the evil day” in the Psaltirea Scheiană.^[13][2]
• 1581 – the verb iuți in Coresi's Carte de învățătură.^[2]
• 1649 – Mardarie's lexicon glosses Slavonic words for “sudden” and “harsh” with it.^[15]
• 1688 – iute and iuți in the Bucharest Bible.^[16]
• 1837 – iuțeală in Anton Pann's Noul Erotocrit.^[2]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Acting or reacting quickly; quick, prompt; done without delay: un răspuns iute.^[5][2]
2. Running or moving fast; swift: un cal iute.^[5][1]
3. Strong, violent: o ploaie iute.^[5]
4. Easily angered; irritable, hot-tempered: iute la mânie, iute de fire.^[5][2]
5. Having a burning taste; hot, spicy: ardei iute “hot pepper”.^[5][1]
6. Of a smell: sharp and unpleasant; pungent.^[5][2]
7. (dated) Of a blade: sharp, cutting.^[2][3]

Adverb

1. quickly, in haste; at once: Pleacă iute acasă!^[5][14]

Word family

• iutac
• iuțar
• iuți
• iuțeală
• iuțime

Related words

• sprinten
• Old Church Slavonic лютъ (ljutŭ)

Usage notes

Ardei iute “hot pepper” is the usual name of the chilli in Romanian.^[5][1] The comparisons iute ca fulgerul, iute ca săgeata and iute ca gândul “quick as lightning, as an arrow, as thought” are common in folk and literary language.^[3][17]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f 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, 1172
3. ^ 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. iute
4. ^ 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. iute
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 527
6. ^ Kurz, Josef; Hauptová, Zoe (eds.) (1958–1997), Slovník jazyka staroslověnského / Lexicon linguae palaeoslovenicae, 4 vols. + supplements, Praha: Academia; digital ed. gorazd.org
7. ^ a b Georgiev, Vladimir I. et al. (eds.) (1971–), Bălgarski etimologičen rečnik, Sofija: Izdatelstvo na Bălgarskata akademija na naukite, p. 3, 581
8. ^ a b Derksen, Rick (2008), Etymological Dictionary of the Slavic Inherited Lexicon, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 4, Leiden / Boston: Brill
9. ^ a b c d Vasmer, Max (1964–1973), Ètimologičeskij slovar' russkogo jazyka, transl. and suppl. by O. N. Trubačev, 4 vols., Moskva: Progress
10. ^ Laurian, A. T.; Massim, I. C. (1871–1876), Dictionariulu limbei romane, 2 vols., Bucuresci: Noua Typographia a Laboratoriloru Romani
11. ^ 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.)
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 33:21
13. ^ 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. iute
14. ^ a b Macrea, Dimitrie; Petrovici, Emil (coord.) (1955–1957), Dicționarul limbii romîne literare contemporane, 4 vols., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 2, 556
15. ^ 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. iute
16. ^ Biblia, adecă Dumnezeiasca Scriptură a ceii vechi și a ceii noao leage, București, 1688 (ed. 1988, tricentennial edition), p. Proverbs 14:17
17. ^ Șăineanu, Lazăr (1929), Dicționar universal al limbei române, 6th ed., Craiova: Scrisul Românesc, p. 345