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Etymology and origin of the Romanian word miază

miază1 myiasis

Confidence
Established
Formation
Borrowing
Borrowed from
Italian miasi
Ultimate origin
Ancient Greek μυῖα

Forms

miază f (plural miaze)[1]

Etymology

The word for the disease is borrowed from Italian miasi according to DEX 2009 and Wiktionary.[2][1] The neologism dictionaries of Marcu and Maneca and of Marcu give it as borrowed from French myiase instead, and Marcu and Maneca compare Ancient Greek μυῖα (muîa, “fly”).[3][4][5]

Meanings

Noun

  1. (medicine) myiasis: any disease caused by the larvae of flies or other insects lodged in the tissues or cavities of the body.[2][3][1]
  2. A superficial wound caused by fly larvae.[4]

miază2 middle (of the day or night)

Confidence
Established
Formation
Inherited
First attested
1570 Coresi's psalter
Inherited from
Latin media
Ultimate origin
Latin medius

Forms

miază f (uncountable)[1]

Etymology

The word for the middle of the day or night is inherited from Latin media (“middle”), the feminine of medius, which lived on in phrases such as media nox (“midnight”) and media quadragesima (“the middle of Lent”).[2][6][7][8][1] Ciorănescu treats it as the feminine of miez “middle, core”, kept only in compounds such as miazănoapte and miazăzi.[6] South of the Danube it is Aromanian njadzã, “midday; the middle of a season”.[9][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is Coresi's psalter of 1570, in Psalm 118:62, of rising at midnight to praise God.[10] MDA2 cites Ureche's chronicle, where miază păresime names the middle of Lent.[7][11]

Semantic evolution

The noun means the middle of the day or of the night, about twelve o'clock, and is now old or popular.[2][7] It lives mostly in phrases: ziua (la) miaza mare “in broad daylight”, miază cale “halfway along the road”, miază coastă “halfway up a slope” and miază-păresimi, the Wednesday of the fourth week of Lent.[7][8] In Maramureș miază cale is still used for “half the way”.[12] The compounds miazănoapte and miazăzi came to mean “north” and “south”, and the 17th-century lexicons already gloss miază with the Slavonic word for “north”.[6][13]

Timeline

  • 1570 – miază in Psalm 118:62 of Coresi's psalter.[10]
  • 17th century – miază păresime “mid-Lent” in Ureche's chronicle.[7][11]
  • 1664 – miază, glossing Slavonic сѣверъ “north”, in a Slavonic–Romanian lexicon.[13]
  • 1688 – miază in Luke 11:5 of the Bucharest Bible.[14]

Meanings

Noun

  1. (obsolete and popular) The middle of the day or of the night, about twelve o'clock: ziua la miaza mare “in broad daylight”.[2][7][8][1]
  2. (regional) In miază cale (or cărare), the point halfway along a road.[7][8][12]
  3. In miază-păresimi, the middle of Lent, which always falls on the Wednesday of its fourth week.[7]

Word family

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 648
  3. ^ a b Marcu, Florin; Maneca, Constant (1986), Dicționar de neologisme, 3rd ed., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Socialiste România, p. s.v. miază
  4. ^ a b Marcu, Florin (2000), Marele dicționar de neologisme, București: Saeculum Vizual, p. s.v. miază
  5. ^ Liddell, Henry George; Scott, Robert; Jones, Henry Stuart (1940), A Greek-English Lexicon, 9th ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
  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. miez
  7. ^ a b c d e f g h Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 2, 1
  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. miază
  9. ^ Pascu, Giorge (1925), Dictionnaire étymologique macédoroumain, 2 vols. (I: Les éléments latins et romans; II: Les éléments grecs, turcs, slaves, albanais, germaniques, magyars, néologismes, créations immédiates, obscurs), Iași: Cultura Națională, p. 1, 132
  10. ^ 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 118:62
  11. ^ a b Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. miez
  12. ^ a b Ștef, Dorin (2021), Dicționar de regionalisme și arhaisme din județul Maramureș, 3rd ed., Baia Mare, p. s.v. miază
  13. ^ a b 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. miază
  14. ^ Biblia, adecă Dumnezeiasca Scriptură a ceii vechi și a ceii noao leage, București, 1688 (ed. 1988, tricentennial edition), p. Luke 11:5

Related etymologies

  • casă · also from Italian
  • la · also from Italian
  • fugă · also from Italian
  • vioară · also from Italian
  • abate · also from Italian
  • arie · also from Italian
  • cameră · also from Italian
  • special · also from Italian
Cite this entry

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

Last edited on . ·