noroi

Forms

noroi n (plural noroaie)^[1]

Etymology

According to DEX, MDA2 and Wiktionary it is borrowed from Bulgarian нарой (naroj), from Proto-Slavic *narojь.^[2][3][1] The Bulgarian etymological dictionary records the Bulgarian word in the dialects with the sense “alluvial deposit” and connects it with рой (roj) and река (reka, “river”); it compares the Romanian word and says it may come from Bulgarian.^[4]

Tiktin and Ciorănescu derive it instead from Old Church Slavonic нарои (naroi, “onrush, impetus”), a word of the Slavic stem *ri- “to move, to flow”.^[5][6][7] Ciorănescu adds that the Bulgarian form with /o/ seems to come from Romanian, since a word taken from Slavic would have kept the /a/.^[6][6] The older derivation from Slavonic нора (nora, “den, burrow”), proposed by Miklosich and Cihac, he finds improbable.^[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is in the Latin–Romanian glossary known as Anonymus Caransebesiensis, which Tiktin dates to about 1670 and MDA2 to 1650–1700.^[5][3] The Bible of 1688 has it in Psalm 68: „Înfigu-mă în noroiul adâncului” “I sink in the mud of the deep”.^[5][8]

Semantic evolution

The core sense is earth soaked with rain or melted snow; from it come the mud left by rivers on their banks and beds, and a muddy place.^[3][9] Old texts and writers of the early 19th century also have the form năroi: Radu Popescu writes that an army could not pass a forest for the rains and năroaie, and Budai-Deleanu and Donici use năroi.^[9]

The figurative sense of moral filth and degradation is old in the phrases: Pann's proverb „Fuge de ploaie și dă în noroaie” “he runs from the rain and falls into the mud” matches English “out of the frying pan into the fire”,^[5] and Costinescu lists a scoate pe cineva din noroi “to get someone out of a scrape, out of poverty”.^[10] Regional senses include a mix of earth, straw and chaff for building walls, land ploughed two or three times after breaking the sod, and a children's game, de-a noroiul.^[3] The oil industry uses noroi de sapă for drilling mud.^[2]

Timeline

• c. 1670 – the first record, in the Anonymus Caransebesiensis glossary.^[5][3]
• 1688 – noroiul adâncului “the mud of the deep” in the Bucharest Bible.^[8][5]
• 1764 – the derivative înnoroi “to cover with mud”.^[11]
• 1870 – the figurative a scoate pe cineva din noroi in Costinescu.^[10]

Meanings

Noun

1. mud: earth mixed with water and softened; a muddy place;^[2][3][1] noroi de sapă “drilling mud”.^[2][3][1]
2. Silt laid down on the bed or banks of a river or on flooded land.^[3]
3. (figurative) Moral filth: base conduct, degradation, a corrupt milieu.^[2][12]
4. (regional) Earth mixed with straw and chaff, trodden with the feet and used to build the walls of houses.^[3]

Word family

• noroială
• noroios
• înnoroi

Usage notes

The expression a împroșca pe cineva cu noroi (or a zvârli cu noroi în cineva) means “to slander someone”.^[2] Tiktin notes that Moldova uses glod and Transylvania tină instead;^[5] Scriban labels the word western.^[12]

A verb noroi (noroiesc) “to sink in mud, to cover with mud, to muddy” is formed from the noun and recorded in the same glossary of about 1670.^[2][5][3]

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ 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. 721
3. ^ 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, 168
4. ^ Georgiev, Vladimir I. et al. (eds.) (1971–), Bălgarski etimologičen rečnik, Sofija: Izdatelstvo na Bălgarskata akademija na naukite, p. 4, 513
5. ^ a b c d e f g h Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. noroi
6. ^ 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. noroi
7. ^ Vasmer, Max (1964–1973), Ètimologičeskij slovar' russkogo jazyka, transl. and suppl. by O. N. Trubačev, 4 vols., Moskva: Progress
8. ^ a b Biblia, adecă Dumnezeiasca Scriptură a ceii vechi și a ceii noao leage, București, 1688 (ed. 1988, tricentennial edition), p. Ps 68:2
9. ^ a b Academia Română (1965–2010), Dicționarul limbii române (DLR), serie nouă, tom I–XIX, București: Editura Academiei Române, p. s.v. noroi
10. ^ a b Costinescu, Ion (1870), Vocabularu romano-francesu, 2 vols., Bucuresci, p. 2, 181
11. ^ Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 1, 1243
12. ^ a b Scriban, August (1939), Dicționaru limbii românești (etimologii, înțelesuri, exemple, citațiuni, arhaizme, neologizme, provincializme), Iași: Presa Bună