muced

Forms

muced m or n (feminine singular mucedă, masculine plural mucezi, feminine/neuter plural mucede)^[1] The old form mucid: Nicolae Costin writes of „grâu care puțea sau mucid” “wheat that stank or was mouldy”.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin mūcidus (“mouldy, musty”).^{[4][5][6][1][7]} The Latin adjective also meant “snivelling” in Plautus, and is formed on mūceō (“to be musty”).^[8][1] Tiktin also gives muccidus.^[3]

The Romance cognates include Italian mucido, Occitan muide and French moite (“damp”).^[4][7] The REW explains the French word by a crossing with musteus.^[7]

The noun mucegai “mould” was formed on the verb mucezi, as putregai on putrezi, according to Tiktin and Ciorănescu.^[4] Pușcariu compared it with Italian moccicaglia, and Pascu derived it from the adjective with a suffix -aie.^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is the plural mucede in a Slavonic–Romanian lexicon of about 1660–1670, which Tiktin also cites.^[9][3] MDA2 dates it to the Bucharest Bible of 1688, where the Gibeonites' bread „s-au făcut uscate și mucede” “had become dry and mouldy” (Joshua 9:5).^[5][2][10]

Semantic evolution

The adjective is used of food, wood, walls and earth covered with mould, and of the smell of mould.^[2][5] Of old books and paper it means yellowed and worn by time, as in Eminescu: „pe mucedele pagini stau domniile române” “on the mouldy pages stand the Romanian reigns”.^[6][3] Figuratively it means outdated.^[5] Regional senses include a smoky grey or blue-black colour of horses, damp ground in Maramureș, and muced de beat “dead drunk”.^[6][11][5] Pann records the proverb vine rânced lângă muced, said when like rogues gather.^[2]

Timeline

• c. 1660–1670 – mucede in a Slavonic–Romanian lexicon, the first record.^[9]
• 1688 – mucede “mouldy” of bread in the Bucharest Bible.^[5][10]
• 1765 – fântâna mucidă “the mouldy well”, a landmark in a document.^[2]
• 1801 – muced in Klein's dictionary.^[12]
• 1825 – muced in the Lexicon de la Buda.^[13]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Covered or penetrated by mould; mucegăit, musty.^[6][1]
2. (of books, paper) Yellowed by age; worn.^[6][5]
3. (of a taste or smell) Like that of mould.^[5]
4. (regional, of horses) Smoky grey, blue-black.^[6][5]
5. (figurative) outdated.^[5]

Word family

• mucezi
• mucezeală
• mucegai
• mucegăios
• mucegăi

Related words

• muc
• Latin mūcidus

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e Academia Română (1965–2010), Dicționarul limbii române (DLR), serie nouă, tom I–XIX, București: Editura Academiei Române, p. s.v. muced
3. ^ 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. múced
4. ^ 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. muced
5. ^ 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. 2, 69
6. ^ a b c d e f DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 679
7. ^ a b c Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 5711
8. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
9. ^ 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. mucede
10. ^ a b Biblia, adecă Dumnezeiasca Scriptură a ceii vechi și a ceii noao leage, București, 1688 (ed. 1988, tricentennial edition), p. Josh 9:5
11. ^ Ștef, Dorin (2021), Dicționar de regionalisme și arhaisme din județul Maramureș, 3rd ed., Baia Mare, p. s.v. múced
12. ^ Gáldi, László (ed.) (1944), Samuel Klein: Dictionarium valachico-latinum. Primul dicționar al limbii române, Budapest: Királyi Magyar Pázmány Péter Tudományegyetemi Román Intézet (Klein's dictionary of 1801, with Gáldi's etymological study), p. 401
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. 403