județ

Forms

județ n (plural județe)^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin iūdicium (“legal proceedings, trial; judgment”), which Latin formed on iūdex (“judge”).^{[2][3][4][5][6][7][1]} The DLR notes that the Latin word meant “judge” and “place of judgment” as well as “judgment”, which accounts for the old Romanian senses.^[8] Byck and Graur explained the word through the plural of jude “judge”, which Ciorănescu finds improbable.^[2]

The word survives south of the Danube: Aromanian giudets “judgment, court” and Megleno-Romanian județ “judgment, tribunal”.^[2][9][10] Its Romance cognates include Italian giudizio and Spanish juicio.^[2] Albanian gjyq (“court, trial”) is a loan from the same Latin word.^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is of 1431, in the Slavonic documents of the Romanian lands.^[11] In Romanian texts it appears in the Codicele Voronețean (c. 1563–1583) with the sense “judgment”: „Dereptu învierea morțiloru cu giudețu preemescu dila voi” “for the resurrection of the dead I am judged by you”.^[3][8] Coresi's Psalter of 1570 uses it often for the judgment of God.^[12]

Semantic evolution

In the old language the word meant a judgment or sentence, a trial and a court, and județul de apoi was the Last Judgment.^[11][3][8] From “judge” it came to name the head of a town: in Wallachia and Transylvania the județ governed a town with the help of the pârgari, usually twelve.^[11][13] Ureche writes of a king who set up județii of his own to rule the land.^[11][14]

The territorial sense grew from the area under a judge's authority.^[15] In Wallachia the județ was the administrative district that Moldavia called ținut.^[4][14] Costinescu (1870) lists Romania's județe beside the French departments and the Swiss cantons.^[16] Today it is the main administrative unit of Romania.^[4] The person senses take a masculine plural județi, the others a neuter plural județe.^[4] In criminal slang județ is a thief of the same gang.^[17]

Timeline

• 1431 – a record in the Slavonic charters of the Romanian lands, the first.^[11]
• c. 1563–1583 – giudețu “judgment” in the Codicele Voronețean.^[3][8]
• 1570 – frequent in Coresi's Psalter.^[12]
• 1649 – Mardarie's lexicon glosses Slavonic words for “court” and “judgment” with it.^[18]
• 1825 – the Lexicon de la Buda gives “judge” and “judgment, tribunal”, with judeçulu quelu mai de pre urmă “the Last Judgment”.^[19]
• 1870 – Județŭ “district”, the division of Romania.^[16]

Meanings

Noun

1. (historical, Wallachia; masculine) the head of a town; mayor.^[4]
2. (archaic and regional; masculine) a judge.^[4][20]
3. (archaic) a judgment, a trial.^[4][21]
4. (archaic, Christianity) the Last Judgment.^[4]
5. (historical, Wallachia) an administrative division, corresponding to the Moldavian ținut.^[4]
6. A county: an administrative unit of Romania made up of several towns and communes.^[4][22][1]

Word family

• județean

Related words

• jude
• judeca
• Aromanian giudets
• Latin iūdicium

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ 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. județ
3. ^ a b c d Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 1, 1290
4. ^ 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. 568
5. ^ Pușcariu, Sextil (1905), Etymologisches Wörterbuch der rumänischen Sprache I: Lateinisches Element, Heidelberg: Carl Winter, p. 80
6. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 4601
7. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ a b c d Academia Română (1965–2010), Dicționarul limbii române (DLR), serie nouă, tom I–XIX, București: Editura Academiei Române, p. s.v. județ
9. ^ Papahagi, Tache (1963), Dicționarul dialectului aromân, general și etimologic, București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 535
10. ^ Capidan, Theodor (1935), Meglenoromânii III: Dicționar meglenoromân, București: Academia Română, p. 161
11. ^ 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. județ
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 9:4
13. ^ Candrea, I.-A.; Adamescu, Gh. (1926–1931), Dicționarul enciclopedic ilustrat „Cartea Românească”, București: Cartea Românească, p. s.v. județ
14. ^ a b Scriban, August (1939), Dicționaru limbii românești (etimologii, înțelesuri, exemple, citațiuni, arhaizme, neologizme, provincializme), Iași: Presa Bună, p. 1, 718
15. ^ Șăineanu, Lazăr (1929), Dicționar universal al limbei române, 6th ed., Craiova: Scrisul Românesc, p. 1, 350
16. ^ a b Costinescu, Ion (1870), Vocabularu romano-francesu, 2 vols., Bucuresci, p. 2, 5
17. ^ Volceanov, George (2007), Dicționar de argou al limbii române, București: Niculescu, p. s.v. județ
18. ^ 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. județ
19. ^ 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.), p. 337
20. ^ Ștef, Dorin (2021), Dicționar de regionalisme și arhaisme din județul Maramureș, 3rd ed., Baia Mare, p. s.v. județ
21. ^ Macrea, Dimitrie; Petrovici, Emil (coord.) (1955–1957), Dicționarul limbii romîne literare contemporane, 4 vols., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 2, 705
22. ^ Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2002), Noul dicționar explicativ al limbii române, București: Litera Internațional, p. s.v. județ