mereu

Forms

mereu adverb and adjective (feminine mereie, plural merei, mereie).^[1] Old texts have mereae and meree, regional speech meriu and mireu.^[2][3]

Etymology

Its origin is disputed.^[4][1] Tamás lists it among the Hungarian elements of Romanian: borrowed from Hungarian merő (“rigid, fixed”).^[3] DEX, MDA2 and the DLR compare the Hungarian word without deciding.^[1][2][5] Bogrea and Scriban had made the same comparison.^[4] The Hungarian word is recorded from 1341 as “rigid, firm”, and its adverb ⟨merőn⟩ meant “ceaselessly” in 1873; it is a participle of the stem of mered (“to stiffen”).^[6][7]

Ciorănescu finds the Hungarian source unconvincing and calls the word of unknown origin.^[4] He suggests a derivative of ⟨mere⟩, the dialect form of merge “to go, to continue”, though the suffix ⟨-eu⟩ is rare, and notes that the word is used in all Romanian provinces but not in the dialects south of the Danube.^[4] Wiktionary gives both proposals.^[8] Cihac had derived it from a Latin ⟨*mereus⟩, for Latin merus (“pure, unmixed”).^[9] NODEX gives it as of unknown origin.^[10]

Earliest recorded meaning

Tiktin's first record is an adjective in the translation of Exodus of 1581–1582 (37:22).^[11] MDA2, Tamás and the DLR begin with a Moldavian letter of 1617: „Turcii fac podur[i] mereae pre Dunăre” “the Turks are building fixed bridges over the Danube”.^[2][3][5]

Semantic evolution

The old sense is “fixed, solid”: a pod mereu was a fixed bridge from bank to bank, as opposed to a ferry, the pod umblător, a usage common in the Moldavian chroniclers.^[5][12][11] Old texts also used it for “all of one piece”, a church cut from one stone or a field like one sheet of emerald, and regional speech for round, unsplit timber.^[5][3] From “unbroken” came “continuous, stretching far”, as in codrii merei “endless forests”.^[5][13]

The adverb “continually, always”, now the main sense, is recorded in Transylvania and Moldavia.^[3][11] In Banat, Oltenia and parts of Transylvania it means instead “slowly, gently, quietly”, the sense Klein's dictionary of 1801 and the Lexicon of Buda (1825) give.^[4][3][14] In Muntenia the adjective also means “stiff, paralysed” and “weak, feeble”.^[2][15]

Timeline

• 1581-1582 – first record, as an adjective, in a translation of Exodus.^[11]
• 1617 – pod mereu “fixed bridge” in a Moldavian letter.^[2][3]
• 1645 – “of one piece”, in the Romanian Herodotus.^[5][3]
• 1782 – pădurile meree “the unbroken forests” in a document.^[5]
• 1801 – “slowly, gently” in Klein's dictionary.^[3]
• 1862 – Pontbriant gives only the adverb “continually, always”.^[16]

Meanings

Adverb

1. always, continually, without a break; at short intervals; more and more: Se plânge mereu de ceva.^[1][2][8]
2. (regional) slowly, unhurriedly; quietly, calmly.^[1][4]

Adjective

1. (dated and regional) Continuous, unbroken; stretching far, vast.^[1][2]
2. (regional, in the plural, of living beings) Many, numerous.^[1][2]
3. (dated) Fixed, in pod mereu “fixed bridge”.^[2][12]

Related words

• merge
• Hungarian merő

Usage notes

The adverb is often strengthened by tot: tot mereu “all the time”.^[11][13] Regionally a sta mereu means “to keep still”.^[2]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 641
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 1, 1489
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i Tamás, Lajos (1966), Etymologisch-historisches Wörterbuch der ungarischen Elemente im Rumänischen, Budapest: Akadémiai Kiadó, p. 529
4. ^ a b c d e f 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. mereu
5. ^ a b c d e f g Academia Română (1965–2010), Dicționarul limbii române (DLR), serie nouă, tom I–XIX, București: Editura Academiei Române, p. s.v. mereu
6. ^ Benkő, Loránd (ed.) (1967–1976), A magyar nyelv történeti-etimológiai szótára, 3 vols., Budapest: Akadémiai Kiadó, p. 2, 902
7. ^ Gerstner, Károly (ed.) (2006–), Új magyar etimológiai szótár, Budapest: Nyelvtudományi Kutatóközpont; online at uesz.nytud.hu, p. s.v. merő
8. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
9. ^ Cihac, A. de (1870), Dictionnaire d'étymologie daco-romane I: Éléments latins comparés avec les autres langues romanes, Frankfurt am Main, p. 162
10. ^ Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2002), Noul dicționar explicativ al limbii române, București: Litera Internațional, p. s.v. mereu
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. meréu
12. ^ a b Costinescu, Mariana; Georgescu, Magdalena; Zgraon, Florentina (1987), Dicționarul limbii române literare vechi (1640–1780): termeni regionali, București: Editura Științifică și Enciclopedică, p. 1, 182
13. ^ a b Macrea, Dimitrie; Petrovici, Emil (coord.) (1955–1957), Dicționarul limbii romîne literare contemporane, 4 vols., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 3, 58
14. ^ 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. 386
15. ^ Marin, Maria; Mărgărit, Iulia, Glosar dialectal. Muntenia, București: Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti”, p. 260
16. ^ Pontbriant, Raoul de (1862), Dictiunaru romano-francesu, Bucuresci: A. Ulrich / Göttingen: Dieterich, p. 432