martie

Forms

martie m (uncountable)^[1] The old and popular variant mart appears in Miron Costin: „O iarnă ce cădzuse în luna lui mart” “a winter that had come in the month of March”.^[2][3] Neculce writes martu: „păn-la 20 de dzile a lui martu” “until the 20th day of March”.^[2] A popular variant marte occurs in Coșbuc.^[4][3]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Old Church Slavonic мартии (martii), with the variant мартъ (martŭ), the name of the month in the church calendar;^{[3][5][2][6][1]} DEX, MDA2, the DLR and Tiktin give this source.^{[3][5][2][6][1]} Ciorănescu takes it from Modern Greek μάρτιος (mártios), partly through the Slavonic word and Serbo-Croatian март (mart).^[7] The Slavonic word is from Byzantine Greek Μάρτιος (Mártios), from Latin mārtius (“of Mars”), the Roman month being named after the god Mars.^{[1][8][9][10][1]} Bulgarian март (mart) and the Russian name of the month came by the same route.^[9][10] Compare Megleno-Romanian marta.^[7]

The Latin word also survives directly as marț “March”, now rare and popular, which this word replaced;^[7][3][1] Wiktionary calls the two doublets.^[7][3][1] Its Romance cognates include Italian marzo, French mars, Spanish marzo and Portuguese março.^[11]

Earliest recorded meaning

Tiktin's first record is a Slavonic charter of 1512, which uses the Romanian form.^[6] In Romanian chronicles it dates events: Grigore Ureche writes „Vă leato 6990 martie 10 au luatu Ștefan vodă citatea Crăciuna” “in the year 6990, on March 10, Prince Stephen took the fortress of Crăciuna”.^[2]

Semantic evolution

The word has only ever named the third month of the year.^[3][2] The old texts use the forms mart, martu and marți beside martie, and mart was still used by Kogălniceanu and Sadoveanu.^[2][4] Folk speech also calls the month mărțișor, marț and, rarely, germănar.^[2][5]

Because part of the Lenten fast always falls in March, the saying martie din post nu lipsește “March is never missing from Lent” is said of someone who never misses a gathering or a chance of gain.^[6][12][5] In Old Church Slavonic the month is recorded in calendars and in the Codex Suprasliensis.^[8] In Bulgarian the word also names the red-and-white amulet worn from March 1.^[9]

Timeline

• 1512 – first record, in a Slavonic charter.^[6]
• c. 1642–1647 – martie 10 in Grigore Ureche's chronicle.^[2]
• 1699 – a lui mart “of March” in a text in Gaster's chrestomathy.^[2]
• 1750 – luna lui marți “the month of March” in a document.^[2]
• 1799 – în luna lui martie in a text in Gaster's chrestomathy.^[2]
• 1825 – Martie in the Lexicon of Buda, glossed Latin Martius and Hungarian Mártzius.^[13]

Meanings

Noun

1. March, the third month of the year, after februarie.^[3][5][1]

Related words

• marț
• mărțișor
• Latin mārtius

Usage notes

Month names are written lowercase: pe 10 martie “on 10 March”.^[1] The saying martie din post nu lipsește, also ca-n martie postul, is said of someone found wherever there is something to be had.^[5][4]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ 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. martie
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. 621
4. ^ a b c Macrea, Dimitrie; Petrovici, Emil (coord.) (1955–1957), Dicționarul limbii romîne literare contemporane, 4 vols., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 3, 21
5. ^ a b c d e f Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 1, 1437
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. martie
7. ^ 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. marț
8. ^ a b Kurz, Josef; Hauptová, Zoe (eds.) (1958–1997), Slovník jazyka staroslověnského / Lexicon linguae palaeoslovenicae, 4 vols. + supplements, Praha: Academia; digital ed. gorazd.org
9. ^ a b c Georgiev, Vladimir I. et al. (eds.) (1971–), Bălgarski etimologičen rečnik, Sofija: Izdatelstvo na Bălgarskata akademija na naukite, p. 3, 672
10. ^ a b Vasmer, Max (1964–1973), Ètimologičeskij slovar' russkogo jazyka, transl. and suppl. by O. N. Trubačev, 4 vols., Moskva: Progress, p. 2, 575
11. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
12. ^ Candrea, I.-A.; Adamescu, Gh. (1926–1931), Dicționarul enciclopedic ilustrat „Cartea Românească”, București: Cartea Românească, p. s.v. martie
13. ^ 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. 378