nor

Forms

nor m (plural nori)^[1] Old texts write nuor and nuăr: the Apocalypse of the Apostle Paul has „Văzuiu un nuoru de focu presprea totul pământul” “I saw a cloud of fire over the whole earth”.^[2] Moldavian has nour, Banat and Transylvania nuăr, nuor and noor, and Banat and Oltenia also nuvăr.^[2][3] Dosoftei uses the Moldavian form: „Și nouri de lăcustă” “and clouds of locusts”.^[2]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin nūbilum (“cloudy sky”), the noun use of the neuter of nūbilus (“cloudy”), from nūbēs (“cloud”).^{[3][4][5][2][1]} The Latin noun is traced to Proto-Indo-European *(s)newdʰ- (“to cover”).^[6][1]

Candrea and Densusianu set out the changes as ⟨*nuer⟩, then nuăr and nuor, then noor, nour and the standard form;^[7] Banat nuhăr and nuvăr fill the hiatus with a consonant, as in măduvă.^[7] Graur put the survival of /ou/ and /oo/ in the variants down to the following /r/.^[3] Pascu set up a base *nibulum, which Ciorănescu finds unnecessary; the REW gives that form for northern Italian and Occitan words.^[3][8]

The word survives in all four branches: Aromanian nior, Megleno-Romanian nor and Istro-Romanian nor.^{[3][9][10][11]} Its Romance cognates include Italian nuvolo, Occitan nivol, Catalan núvol and Spanish nublo.^[3][8]

Earliest recorded meaning

Tiktin's first record is a document of 1454.^[2] In Romanian texts the word appears in the Psaltirea Hurmuzaki of the early 16th century, as nuor “cloud”.^[5][12] Coresi's Evanghelie cu învățătură (1581) has „Nuor și negură împrejurul lui” “cloud and darkness round about him”.^[13]

Semantic evolution

Besides the cloud of water drops, the word names a dense mass of dust or smoke and, figuratively, a crowd or swarm that darkens the sky.^[4] Scriban adds a shadow of sadness on a face or anything that troubles a calm.^[14] Phrases include a trăi cu capul în nori “to have one's head in the clouds”, parcă a căzut din nori “as if fallen from the clouds”, of someone lost in his surroundings, and the proverb după nor vine senin “after the cloud comes clear sky”.^[4][2]

Modern scientific use added nor arzător for the glowing cloud of a volcanic eruption, nor de stele “star cloud” and Norii lui Magellan “the Magellanic Clouds”.^[4] Romanian formed noros “cloudy” and înnora “to cloud over”, and the regional nourată, a sheep with grey wool.^[3]

Timeline

• 1454 – the first record, in a document.^[2]
• early 16th century – nuor in the Psaltirea Hurmuzaki.^[12][5]
• 1581 – Coresi's Evanghelie cu învățătură and the Palia: „Arcul mieu voi pune în nuori” “I will set my bow in the clouds”.^[13]
• 1649 – nuor in Mardarie's Slavonic–Romanian lexicon.^[15]
• 1688 – noor, nor and nuor in the Bucharest Bible.^[16]
• 1825 – the Lexicon de la Buda: nor, plural nori, Latin nubes.^[17]

Meanings

Noun

1. cloud, a mass of water droplets or ice crystals floating in the atmosphere: Norii negri vesteau ploaia.^[4][1]
2. A dense, moving mass of dust, smoke and the like.^[4]
3. (figurative) A dense crowd or swarm of creatures that darkens the horizon.^[4]

Word family

• noros
• înnora

Related words

• Aromanian nior
• Latin nūbilum

Usage notes

A fi nor means “to be overcast”, and până la nori “up to the clouds, very high”.^[4] MDA2 and the DLR also list an old nor as a form of noră “daughter-in-law”, a different word.^[5][13]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. nor
3. ^ a b c d e f g 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. nor
4. ^ 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. 720
5. ^ 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, 165
6. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
7. ^ a b Candrea, I.-A.; Densusianu, Ov. (1907–1914), Dicționarul etimologic al limbii române: elementele latine (A–Putea), București, p. 1240
8. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 5975
9. ^ Papahagi, Tache (1963), Dicționarul dialectului aromân, general și etimologic, București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 769
10. ^ Capidan, Theodor (1935), Meglenoromânii III: Dicționar meglenoromân, București: Academia Română, p. 208
11. ^ Pușcariu, Sextil (1905), Etymologisches Wörterbuch der rumänischen Sprache I: Lateinisches Element, Heidelberg: Carl Winter, p. 103
12. ^ 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 77:17
13. ^ a b c Academia Română (1965–2010), Dicționarul limbii române (DLR), serie nouă, tom I–XIX, București: Editura Academiei Române, p. s.v. nor
14. ^ Scriban, August (1939), Dicționaru limbii românești (etimologii, înțelesuri, exemple, citațiuni, arhaizme, neologizme, provincializme), Iași: Presa Bună, p. 876
15. ^ 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. nuor
16. ^ Biblia, adecă Dumnezeiasca Scriptură a ceii vechi și a ceii noao leage, București, 1688 (ed. 1988, tricentennial edition), p. Gen 9:14
17. ^ 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. 449