păstor

Forms

păstor m (plural păstori, feminine equivalent păstoriță)^[1] An older form păstoriu is common in the 16th and 17th centuries: the Tetraevanghel of 1574 says the crowds were „ca oile ce n-au păstoriu” “like sheep that have no shepherd”.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin pāstor (“shepherd”).^[4][3][5][1] The Latin noun belongs to pāscō (“to graze, to pasture”).^[6]

The regular outcome of the Latin accusative would have kept a final /e/;^[4] Ciorănescu explains the form as a shift to the second declension, as with păun and tăun.^[4] Pușcariu started instead from Vulgar Latin *pastorius, and Tiktin saw the pull of the many Romanian nouns in -oriu from Latin -ōrius, which also explains the old form păstoriu.^[4][7] The word has cognates in two other branches: Megleno-Romanian păstir, which Capidan derives from the same Latin form, and Istro-Romanian pastor, little used there according to Byhan.^[4][8][9] Its Romance cognates include Italian pastore, French pâtre, Occitan pastre, Catalan pastor, Spanish pastor and Portuguese pastor.^[4][10]

Romanian also has the doublet pastor “Protestant minister”, borrowed from German Pastor.^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

MDA2 and Tiktin date the first record to the Codicele Voronețean (c. 1563–1583), in a passage of the First Epistle of Peter (2:25).^[3][7] The Tetraevanghel of 1574 and Coresi's Gospel commentary use it for herdsmen: in Coresi the shepherds flee and go into the town.^[2]

Semantic evolution

Both senses are old: the shepherd of a flock, and, after the Gospel image, a bishop or priest as the shepherd of the faithful;^[7][2] Tiktin labels it old, and in elevated style also modern.^[7][2] The preface of the Bucharest Bible of 1688 calls the metropolitan Theodosie the shepherd of his Christian people.^[7] From the priest the sense widened to any leader or spiritual guide.^[3][5] Regionally the word can name a field or vineyard guard.^[3] NODEX defines it as a minister of the Protestant churches, which is the sense of the doublet pastor.^[11][4]

Ciorănescu, after Candrea, derives Hungarian pásztor from the Romanian word.^[4] The Hungarian etymological dictionary TESz instead calls it a Slavic word, recorded from the 12th century.^[12]

Timeline

• c. 1563-1583 – păstor in the Codicele Voronețean, the first record.^[3][7]
• 1574 – păstoriu in the Tetraevanghel.^[2]
• 1660 – glossed with Old Church Slavonic пастыръ (pastyrŭ) in a Slavonic–Romanian lexicon.^[13]
• 1688 – the Bucharest Bible uses the word often.^[14]

Meanings

Noun

1. A shepherd or herdsman who guards sheep or other grazing animals and takes them to pasture.^[5][3]
2. Păstorul-cu-Oile (popular astronomy): the star cluster also called Cloșca-cu-Pui.^[5][15]
3. (regional) A guard of fields or vineyards.^[3]
4. (figurative) A priest or bishop as guide of the faithful; by extension a leader or spiritual guide.^[5][3]

Word family

• păstorel
• păstori
• păstorie
• păstoresc
• păstorit
• păstoriță
• arhipăstor

Related words

• pastor
• paște

References

1. ^ a b c 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. păstor
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 2, 309
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i 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. păstor
5. ^ a b c d e DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 790
6. ^ Scriban, August (1939), Dicționaru limbii românești (etimologii, înțelesuri, exemple, citațiuni, arhaizme, neologizme, provincializme), Iași: Presa Bună, p. 1, 953
7. ^ a b c d e f Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. păstor
8. ^ Capidan, Theodor (1935), Meglenoromânii III: Dicționar meglenoromân, București: Academia Română, p. 217
9. ^ Byhan, Arthur (1899), Istrorumänisches Glossar, Sechster Jahresbericht des Instituts für rumänische Sprache zu Leipzig: 174–366, p. 303
10. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 6279
11. ^ Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2002), Noul dicționar explicativ al limbii române, București: Litera Internațional, p. s.v. păstor
12. ^ Benkő, Loránd (ed.) (1967–1976), A magyar nyelv történeti-etimológiai szótára, 3 vols., Budapest: Akadémiai Kiadó, p. 3, 125
13. ^ 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. păstor
14. ^ Biblia, adecă Dumnezeiasca Scriptură a ceii vechi și a ceii noao leage, București, 1688 (ed. 1988, tricentennial edition), p. Facerea 46:32
15. ^ Macrea, Dimitrie; Petrovici, Emil (coord.) (1955–1957), Dicționarul limbii romîne literare contemporane, 4 vols., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 3, 360