perete

Forms

perete m (plural pereți)^[1] The old and popular form is părete; regional forms are parete and păreț, the latter with the plural părețuri.^[2][3] Coresi's Carte de învățătură of 1581 has „și păreții cei de vrajbă spart-au cu trupul său” “and he broke down the walls of enmity with his body”.^[4]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin pariēs (“wall”), from the popular accusative ⟨parētem⟩ for classical ⟨parietem⟩.^[5][1][2][6] Of the sister branches, the sources give Istro-Romanian parete.^[5][7] The Romance cognates are Italian parete, Occitan paret, French paroi, Spanish pared and Portuguese parede.^[5][6] Romanian keeps the Latin masculine gender, which elsewhere survives only in a few Italian dialects such as Venetian; the other languages made the word feminine.^[6] The Latin word has no accepted etymology: de Vaan calls the comparison with Germanic words for “beam” a paper reconstruction.^[8]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is părete in the Psaltirea Hurmuzaki of the early 16th century (Psalm 61).^[9] Tiktin's earliest is the Psaltirea Scheiană, and MDA2's is Coresi's Carte de învățătură of 1581.^[10][2] The sense there is the wall of a building.^[4]

Semantic evolution

Beside the wall of a building the word came to mean a steep rock face, a wall-like part of an object or device, and the wall of a body cavity.^[3] In the old chronicles it is also used figuratively for a bulwark or defence.^[10] Many phrases use it: perete în perete “next door”, a da ușa de perete “to fling the door wide open”, pereții au urechi “the walls have ears” and a vorbi la pereți “to talk to the walls”.^[3][10] Someone pale with fright se face cum e păretele “turns as white as the wall”.^[10]

Timeline

• early 16th century – părete in the Psaltirea Hurmuzaki.^[9]
• 16th century – in the Psaltirea Scheiană, Tiktin's first record.^[10]
• 1581 – păreții in Coresi's Carte de învățătură, MDA2's first record.^[2][4]

Meanings

Noun

1. A wall: a vertical structural element that bounds or divides the rooms of a building and carries floors and roof;^[3][2][1] de perete “wall-mounted”.^[3][2][1]
2. A steep rock face, a cliff.^[3]
3. A part of an object or device that bounds, divides or protects like a wall; a partition.^[3]
4. (anatomy) The wall or membrane around a body cavity.^[3]

Related words

• Latin pariēs

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 2, 343
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. 801
4. ^ a b c Academia Română (1965–2010), Dicționarul limbii române (DLR), serie nouă, tom I–XIX, București: Editura Academiei Române, p. s.v. perete
5. ^ a b c 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. perete
6. ^ a b c Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 6242
7. ^ Popovici, Iosif (1909), Dialectele romîne din Istria II: texte și glosar, Halle a. S., p. 133
8. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
9. ^ 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 61:3
10. ^ a b c d e Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. perete