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marcă

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Etymology and origin of the Romanian word marcă

marcă1 mark, sign, brand

Confidence
Established
Formation
Borrowing
First attested
1786 verses in an old print (BV II, 311)
Borrowed from
Modern Greek μάρκα
Ultimate origin
Proto-Germanic *marką

Forms

marcă f (plural mărci)[1]

Etymology

The word for a mark or sign is borrowed from Modern Greek μάρκα (márka), with French marque as a second source and German Marke as a further model, as the DEX and the MDA2 give it.[2][3][4] Ciorănescu names Italian marca and the French word, comparing the Greek and the Bulgarian, Serbian and Russian марка (marka).[5] Tiktin names French, German and Greek.[6] The Bulgarian etymological dictionary calls the word an international cultural loan, of Germanic origin through Medieval Latin marca (“sign”).[7]

The Greek word comes from the Italian and the French ones.[8][9] The French noun is a deverbal of marquer, a dialectal variant (1456) of Old French merchier (“to put a mark on”), a verb formed on merc (“sign”); its vowel ⟨a⟩ may come from Italian marcare.[10][1] The Italian noun is of Germanic origin, from Proto-Germanic *marką.[1] For Aromanian marcă, Papahagi gives an Italian source.[11][12]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is a verse of 1786 on a coat of arms: „Soarele și luna ce în marcă sînt arătate” “the sun and the moon that are shown in the arms”.[13][6][3]

Semantic evolution

The oldest sense is “coat of arms”: in 1804 an Austrian mark cut into a fir tree, in 1829 the aurochs in the arms of Moldavia, and in a law code the arms of a noble family passed to an adopted son.[13][6] The general sense “sign” appears in Negulici in 1848, and the dictionaries of Polizu and Costinescu add a mark put on an object or animal to tell it apart, and a maker's mark on goods.[13][14][15]

The trademark sense led to “make, model” and to de marcă “of high quality”, said also of people: “notable, distinguished”.[2][16] Other senses are concrete: a token or counter used in games instead of money, the numbered metal tag with which workers clock in, and a white marker between two crossing railway lines.[3][2] Figuratively it is a distinctive trait, a stamp: marca geniului “the hallmark of genius”.[17][2] In underworld slang marcă is a member of the criminal world, a mafioso.[18]

Timeline

  • 1786 – marcă “coat of arms”, the first record.[3][6]
  • 1804 – an Austrian boundary mark on a fir tree.[13]
  • 1848 – “sign” in Negulici's dictionary.[14]
  • 1870 – the maker's mark on goods, in Costinescu.[15]
  • 1931 – de marcă “notable” in CADE.[16]

Meanings

Noun

  1. A mark, sign put on an object, product or animal to identify it or tell it apart from others.[2][3]
  2. A brand, make or model: o marcă de ceasuri “a brand of watches”;[2][4] de marcă “of high quality”.[2][4]
  3. (dated) A coat of arms, stemă, emblem;[2][3] de marcă (of people) “notable, distinguished”.[2][3]
  4. A numbered metal tag with which workers record their presence or which they leave for tools they take; a token used instead of money.[2][3]
  5. (railways) A white-painted stone or piece of rail laid between two crossing tracks to mark how far vehicles may advance safely.[2]
  6. (figurative) A distinctive trait, a stamp: marca talentului “the stamp of talent”.[2][4]

marcă2 mark (currency)

Confidence
Established
Formation
Borrowing
First attested
1853 Șincai's chronicle, in its 1853 edition
Borrowed from
German Mark

Forms

marcă f (plural mărci)[1]

Etymology

The word for the currency is borrowed from German Mark.[2][3][13][6][1] The Bulgarian etymological dictionary also derives the name of the currency from German.[7]

Earliest recorded meaning

Șincai's chronicle uses it for an old weight of precious metal: payments were to be measured „fără numai cu marca de argint” “only by the mark of silver”.[13][3]

Semantic evolution

First a unit of weight for gold and silver whose value varied from country to country, it became the name of a currency: Șincai has două marce de aur “two marks of gold” a year, and Xenopol a tax of a mark of silver per knezate.[13] Scriban adds that in Moldavia the mark was divided into grivne, and gives the German silver coin of his time as worth a franc and a quarter in 1916.[19] In Maramureș it named a coin of the Austro-Hungarian Empire.[20] In modern use it is the currency of Germany and Finland before the euro.[2]

Timeline

  • 1853 – marca de argint “the mark of silver” in Șincai's chronicle.[3][13]
  • 1939 – Scriban records the Moldavian weight divided into grivne.[19]

Meanings

Noun

  1. The mark, a currency unit of some European countries, especially of Germany and Finland before the euro.[2][1]
  2. (historical) An old unit of weight for gold and silver, whose value varied between countries.[3][13]

Usage notes

The old plural was marce.[3][13] Two further homographs come from German: marcă³, a frontier province under military rule in the Middle Ages (marca de Brandenburg), from German Mark (“frontier province”), recorded in Xenopol; and marcă⁴, a postage stamp, usually marcă poștală, from Marke, recorded in Barițiu's history of Transylvania (1889).[3][13][21] The DLR quotes a 1959 plea to keep timbru for fiscal stamps and marcă for postage stamps.[13]

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 m n o DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 618
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 1, 1432
  4. ^ a b c d Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2002), Noul dicționar explicativ al limbii române, București: Litera Internațional, p. s.v. marcă
  5. ^ 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. marcă
  6. ^ 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. marcă
  7. ^ a b Georgiev, Vladimir I. et al. (eds.) (1971–), Bălgarski etimologičen rečnik, Sofija: Izdatelstvo na Bălgarskata akademija na naukite, p. 3, 669
  8. ^ Ινστιτούτο Νεοελληνικών Σπουδών (Ίδρυμα Μανόλη Τριανταφυλλίδη) (1998), Λεξικό της κοινής νεοελληνικής, Thessaloniki: Aristotle University of Thessaloniki
  9. ^ Babiniotis, Georgios (2010), Ετυμολογικό λεξικό της νέας ελληνικής γλώσσας [Etymological Dictionary of Modern Greek], Athens: Κέντρο Λεξικολογίας
  10. ^ Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
  11. ^ Papahagi, Tache (1963), Dicționarul dialectului aromân, general și etimologic, București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 655
  12. ^ Cunia, Tiberius (2008), Dictsiunar a limbãljei armãneascã, Editsii Timpurarã (after T. Papahagi, Ș. Mihăileanu and I. Dalametra; online at dixionline.net), p. 612
  13. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Academia Română (1965–2010), Dicționarul limbii române (DLR), serie nouă, tom I–XIX, București: Editura Academiei Române, p. s.v. marcă
  14. ^ 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. marcă
  15. ^ a b Costinescu, Ion (1870), Vocabularu romano-francesu, 2 vols., Bucuresci, p. 2, 70
  16. ^ a b Candrea, I.-A.; Adamescu, Gh. (1926–1931), Dicționarul enciclopedic ilustrat „Cartea Românească”, București: Cartea Românească, p. s.v. marcă
  17. ^ Macrea, Dimitrie; Petrovici, Emil (coord.) (1955–1957), Dicționarul limbii romîne literare contemporane, 4 vols., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 3, 17
  18. ^ Volceanov, George (2007), Dicționar de argou al limbii române, București: Niculescu, p. s.v. marcă
  19. ^ a b Scriban, August (1939), Dicționaru limbii românești (etimologii, înțelesuri, exemple, citațiuni, arhaizme, neologizme, provincializme), Iași: Presa Bună, p. 774
  20. ^ Ștef, Dorin (2021), Dicționar de regionalisme și arhaisme din județul Maramureș, 3rd ed., Baia Mare, p. s.v. marcă
  21. ^ Borcia, Ioan (1903–1904), Deutsche Sprachelemente im Rumänischen, Leipzig (in Weigand, Zehnter Jahresbericht des Instituts für rumänische Sprache zu Leipzig), p. 61

Related etymologies

  • casă · also from German
  • pas · also from German
  • lac · also from German
  • rută · also from German
  • arie · also from German
  • laț · also from German
  • must · also from German
  • telefon · also from German
Cite this entry

“Marcă.” Etymologically, 12 Nov. 2026, etymologically.com/ro/marc%C4%83. Accessed 12 Nov. 2026.

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