mărturie

Forms

mărturie f (plural mărturii)^[1] Old texts also have mărtorie: Dosoftei's lives of the saints have „să-mi obârșesc viața în bună mărtorie” “that I may end my life in good witness”.^[2][3]

Etymology

MDA2, the DLR, DEX and Wiktionary take it as a Romanian derivative, formed from Romanian martur + -ie on the older form of martor “witness”.^[4][2][5][1] MDA2 and the DLR compare Ancient Greek μαρτυρία (marturía, “testimony”) and Bulgarian мартория (martorija, “testimony”).^[4][2] Ciorănescu and Tiktin take it straight from the Greek noun instead, and Scriban too, who sees the Bulgarian word as a parallel loan from Greek.^[6][3][7] BER derives the Bulgarian word from Modern Greek.^[8] In either view the root goes back to Greek: Ciorănescu derives the noun for “witness” from μάρτυρ (mártur, “witness”) through Vulgar Latin martur.^[6] The verb mărturisi “to testify, to confess” has the same Greek background, from μαρτυρῶ (marturô), partly through Slavonic.^[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

Tiktin's earliest date for the word is 1418.^[3] In Romanian texts it first appears in the Psaltirea Hurmuzaki of the early 16th century, MDA2's first record.^[4][9] The DLR gives as its oldest sense, now obsolete and confined to the church, the profession of faith.^[2]

Semantic evolution

From the testimony of faith and of a witness the word passed to a statement made to prove something, and to the deposition of a witness in court;^[5][4] mărturie mincinoasă is perjury.^[5][4] In the old language it also meant the witness himself, as in Coresi's „să nu fii mărturie strâmbă vecinului tău” “thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour”.^[3] Further senses are proof or sign, a document that serves as proof, and the medal or small cross that the godparent gives the guests at a baptism.^[4][3] The phrase de mărturie “for show, pro forma” is regional.^[3][4] In Maramureș and Transylvania a mărturie is a weekly market, held on the days when people came to town to give evidence; the Lexicon of Buda already records it.^[10][11][12]

Timeline

• 1418 – Tiktin's earliest date for the word.^[3]
• c. 1500-1520 – mărturie, mărturia and mărturiile in the Psaltirea Hurmuzaki.^[9][4]
• c. 1573-1578 – many forms in the Psaltirea Scheiană.^[13]
• 1642 – „să-i hie dumisale de mărturie” “to serve his lordship as evidence”, in a deed.^[3]
• 1649 – Mardarie's lexicon glosses Slavonic послухъ “witness” and свѣдителство “testimony” with it.^[14]
• 1688 – some 400 forms in the Bucharest Bible.^[15]
• 1801 – Klein's dictionary, with the sense “weekly market”.^[12]

Meanings

Noun

1. testimony: a statement made to confirm something or to support one's views; specifically, the deposition of a witness in court: mărturie mincinoasă “perjury”;^[5][4][1] a sta mărturie “to bear witness, to be present”.^[5][4][1]
2. (obsolete) The profession of faith;^[5][4] (rare) a witness.^[5][4]
3. proof, evidence; a sign or token: Ruinele sunt mărturia unui trecut glorios. “The ruins bear witness to a glorious past.”^[5][16]
4. A small medal or cross given by the godparent to those present at a baptism.^[4][7]
5. (regional) A weekly market, in Maramureș and Transylvania.^[5][10]

Related words

• martor
• mărturisi
• martir
• Ancient Greek μαρτυρία (marturía)

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d Academia Română (1965–2010), Dicționarul limbii române (DLR), serie nouă, tom I–XIX, București: Editura Academiei Române, p. s.v. mărturie
3. ^ a b c d e f g h Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. mărturie
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 1, 1458
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 1, 629
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. martor
7. ^ a b Scriban, August (1939), Dicționaru limbii românești (etimologii, înțelesuri, exemple, citațiuni, arhaizme, neologizme, provincializme), Iași: Presa Bună, p. 1, 788
8. ^ Georgiev, Vladimir I. et al. (eds.) (1971–), Bălgarski etimologičen rečnik, Sofija: Izdatelstvo na Bălgarskata akademija na naukite, p. 3, 675
9. ^ 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 77:6
10. ^ a b Ștef, Dorin (2011), Dicționar de regionalisme și arhaisme din Maramureș, Baia Mare: Ethnologica, p. s.v. mărturie
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.), p. 379
12. ^ a b Gáldi, László (ed.) (1944), Samuel Klein: Dictionarium valachico-latinum. Primul dicționar al limbii române, Budapest: Királyi Magyar Pázmány Péter Tudományegyetemi Román Intézet (Klein's dictionary of 1801, with Gáldi's etymological study), p. 237
13. ^ 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 18:8
14. ^ 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. mărturie
15. ^ Biblia, adecă Dumnezeiasca Scriptură a ceii vechi și a ceii noao leage, București, 1688 (ed. 1988, tricentennial edition), p. Exodus 25:22
16. ^ Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2002), Noul dicționar explicativ al limbii române, București: Litera Internațional, p. s.v. mărturie