ou

Forms

ou n (plural ouă)^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin ōvum (“egg”), perhaps through a Vulgar Latin form with a short vowel.^{[2][3][4][5][1]} The Latin word comes from *h₂ōwyóm (“egg”), and is related to Ancient Greek ᾠόν (ōión).^[1][6]

It survives in all four branches: Aromanian ou, Megleno-Romanian uou and Istro-Romanian owu.^[2][7][8][9] Its Romance cognates include Dalmatian yuv, Italian uovo, Catalan ou, French œuf, Spanish huevo and Portuguese ovo.^[2][5] The verb oua “to lay eggs” is probably directly from Vulgar Latin *ovō.^[2][5]

Earliest recorded meaning

Tiktin's first record is Coresi's Pravila of about 1560.^[10] Coresi's Tetraevanghel has „Sau de va ceare ou, doară va da lui scorpiie?” “or if he asks for an egg, will he give him a scorpion?” (Luke 11:12).^[10] MDA2's first record is the Cuvente den bătrâni, before 1588.^[4]

Semantic evolution

Old texts have the plural oauă, and regional speech ouri.^[4] Beside the egg as food, the word names egg-shaped things: oul genunchiului is the kneecap, and in Oltenia oușor is the uvula.^[10][3] Folk plant names use it, such as ouăle popii for hellebore.^[10] In slang the plural means testicles.^[2][1] Biology made it the word for the fertilized egg cell.^[3][4] Ouă roșii are the red Easter eggs.^[10]

Timeline

• c. 1560 – in Coresi's Pravila, Tiktin's first record.^[10]
• before 1588 – in the Cuvente den bătrâni, MDA2's first record.^[4]
• 1649 – oul in Mardarie's Slavonic–Romanian lexicon.^[11]
• 1688 – ou in Luke 11:12 in the Bucharest Bible.^[12]

Meanings

Noun

1. An egg, especially a hen's egg with its shell, white and yolk, eaten as food: un ou fiert.^[3][1]
2. The egg laid by birds, reptiles and other oviparous animals, in which the embryo develops.^[3][4]
3. (biology) The cell formed by a fertilized ovum, a zygote.^[3][4]
4. An object shaped like an egg, and (popular) oul genunchiului the kneecap.^[3]
5. (slang, in the plural) Testicles.^[2][1]

Word family

• ouătoare
• oua

Related words

• Aromanian ou
• Latin ōvum

Usage notes

Common phrases are a sta pe ouă “to brood”, a umbla ca pe ouă “to tread very carefully” and oul lui Columb “the egg of Columbus”, a simple solution to a problem that looked hard.^[3] A proverb says A ajuns oul mai cuminte decât găina “the egg has grown wiser than the hen”.^[10]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f 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. ou
3. ^ 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. 758
4. ^ a b c d e f g Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 2, 239
5. ^ a b c Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 6128
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. ^ 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, 137
8. ^ Capidan, Theodor (1935), Meglenoromânii III: Dicționar meglenoromân, București: Academia Română, p. 316
9. ^ Byhan, Arthur (1899), Istrorumänisches Glossar, Sechster Jahresbericht des Instituts für rumänische Sprache zu Leipzig: 174–366, p. 296
10. ^ 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. ou
11. ^ 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. oul
12. ^ Biblia, adecă Dumnezeiasca Scriptură a ceii vechi și a ceii noao leage, București, 1688 (ed. 1988, tricentennial edition), p. Luca 11:12