mort

Forms

mort m or n (feminine singular moartă, masculine plural morți, feminine/neuter plural moarte)^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Vulgar Latin *mortus, from Latin mortuus (“dead”), the participle of morior (“to die”).^{[1][2][3][4][5][6]} The Latin word goes back to Proto-Indo-European *mr̥twós (“dead”), from *mer- (“to die”).^[1]

It survives in all four branches: Aromanian mortu, Megleno-Romanian mort and Istro-Romanian mort.^{[2][7][8][9][10]} Its Romance cognates include Italian morto, French mort, Catalan mort, Spanish muerto and Portuguese morto.^[2][5]

Earliest recorded meaning

The Psaltirea Hurmuzaki of the early 16th century has mortul “the dead man” in Psalm 30.^[11] MDA2's first record is the Codicele Voronețean of about 1563: „va cădea de năprasnă mortu” “he will suddenly fall down dead”.^[3][12]

Semantic evolution

The sense “dead” has stayed at the centre.^[4][13] Tiktin quotes Neculce on Tatars who were morți de frică “paralysed with fear”, and the negative nemort “immortal” from an inscription of 1679.^[13] Modern technical phrases use the word for something inactive: limbă moartă “dead language”, timp mort “idle time”, unghi mort “dead angle”, punct mort “dead centre” and figuratively “deadlock”, and natură moartă “still life”.^[4][13] As a noun it names a dead person or a corpse.^[4][1]

Aromanian mortu also means “ruined”, and forms the adverb amortului “stubbornly”.^[7][8] Ciorănescu lists the Romanian derivatives morțiș and morțiu “obstinately” and the Banat word morțărie “cemetery”.^[2]

Timeline

• early 16th century – mortul in the Psaltirea Hurmuzaki.^[11]
• c. 1563 – mortu “dead” in the Codicele Voronețean.^[3][12]
• 1649 – in Mardarie's Slavonic–Romanian lexicon.^[14]
• 1679 – nemoartă “immortal” in an inscription.^[13]

Meanings

Adjective

1. dead: no longer living: Au găsit pasărea moartă în grădină.^[4][3][1]
2. Of parts of the body: without feeling, numb, paralysed;^[4] carne moartă “proud flesh”.^[4]
3. Of plants: dried up, withered.^[4]
4. (figurative) Lifeless, motionless; quiet, without activity; of colours, dull.^[4]
5. In fixed phrases, out of use or inactive: limbă moartă “dead language”, linie moartă “siding”, punct mort “dead centre; deadlock”.^[4]

Noun

1. A dead person; a corpse.^[4][1]

Word family

• morțiș

Related words

• moarte
• muri
• mortăciune
• Aromanian mortu
• Latin mortuus

Usage notes

Common expressions: mort de beat “dead drunk”, mort-copt “at all costs”, nici mort “not for anything”, and a fi mort după cineva “to be crazy about someone”.^[4]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ 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. mort
3. ^ a b c d Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 2, 58
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 675
5. ^ a b Pușcariu, Sextil (1905), Etymologisches Wörterbuch der rumänischen Sprache I: Lateinisches Element, Heidelberg: Carl Winter, p. 96
6. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 5695
7. ^ a b Papahagi, Tache (1963), Dicționarul dialectului aromân, general și etimologic, București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 703
8. ^ a b 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, 122
9. ^ Kovačec, August (1998), Istrorumunjsko-hrvatski rječnik (s gramatikom i tekstovima), Pula
10. ^ Popovici, Iosif (1909), Dialectele romîne din Istria II: texte și glosar, Halle a. S., p. 127
11. ^ 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 30:15
12. ^ a b Academia Română (1965–2010), Dicționarul limbii române (DLR), serie nouă, tom I–XIX, București: Editura Academiei Române, p. s.v. mort
13. ^ a b c d Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. mort
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. mort