pil

Forms

pil n (plural piluri)^[1]

Etymology

Its origin is uncertain; the DLR, MDA2 and Scriban call it unknown.^[2][3][4][5] Ciorănescu suggests inherited from Vulgar Latin *pillum, beside Vulgar Latin *pilla, which gave piuă, in place of Latin pīla (“pillar”) and pīlum (“javelin”); the word would then first have meant “mortar”.^[2][6] He notes that no palatalised pronunciation that would support this etymon is recorded.^[2] Wiktionary also names the Latin word in its sense “spear”.^[1] Ciorănescu adds that pilos “strong; stubborn” and pilug are taken as its derivatives.^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is in Gorjan's Halima, the Arabian tales, in 1835: a beating of a hundred blows with a whip of ox sinew.^[3][4]

Semantic evolution

The regional dictionaries and glossaries give a short-handled whip of plaited thongs or ox sinew, a crop of plaited willow twigs, a blow with such a whip, and a pestle.^[4][7][3] Ciorănescu has a rod or stick in general and a whip in Oltenia.^[2] Scriban places it in the west, Șăineanu's “pestle” in Transylvania; a Muntenian glossary describes a whip with a thick, leather-plaited handle carried by young men at the dance.^[5][8][9] A folk ballad sings of the boy Iorgovan, „ce bate turcii cu pilul” “who beats the Turks with his whip”.^[3][10]

Timeline

• 1835 – the first record, in Gorjan's Halima.^[3][4]
• 1886 – Barcianu glosses it German Peitsche, Karbatsche.^[11]
• 1929 – Șăineanu records the Transylvanian sense “pestle”.^[8]

Meanings

Noun

1. (regional) A stick, rod.^[2][1]
2. (regional) A short-handled whip of plaited thongs or ox sinew; a blow with it.^[4][3][2]
3. (regional) A pestle (pisălog).^[4][7]

Related words

• piuă

Usage notes

The interjection with which hunters set a dog on the game, the sense of the word in DEX, is borrowed from French pille.^[12][2][3] An imitative pil renders the call of the woodcock.^[3][4] An old pil “pill” of 1778 is borrowed from German Pille.^[3][4] The old pil “elephant; ivory”, from 1649, is a variant of fil, which Scriban takes from Turkish.^[13][5]

References

1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h 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. pil
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i Academia Română (1965–2010), Dicționarul limbii române (DLR), serie nouă, tom I–XIX, București: Editura Academiei Române, p. s.v. pil
4. ^ a b c d e f g h Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 2, 379
5. ^ a b c Scriban, August (1939), Dicționaru limbii românești (etimologii, înțelesuri, exemple, citațiuni, arhaizme, neologizme, provincializme), Iași: Presa Bună, p. 978
6. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
7. ^ a b Bulgăr, Gheorghe; Constantinescu-Dobridor, Gheorghe (2002), Dicționar de arhaisme și regionalisme, 2 vols., București: Saeculum Vizual, p. s.v. pil
8. ^ a b Șăineanu, Lazăr (1929), Dicționar universal al limbei române, 6th ed., Craiova: Scrisul Românesc, p. 481
9. ^ Marin, Maria; Mărgărit, Iulia, Glosar dialectal. Muntenia, București: Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti”
10. ^ Macrea, Dimitrie; Petrovici, Emil (coord.) (1955–1957), Dicționarul limbii romîne literare contemporane, 4 vols., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 3, 419
11. ^ Barcianu, Sava Popovici (1886), Dicționar român-germân și germân-român, revised by D. P. Barcianu, part I: român-germân, Sibiu: Institut tipografic, p. 476
12. ^ DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 818
13. ^ Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. pil