pleda

Forms

pleda (third-person singular present pledează, past participle pledat) 1st conjugation^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from French plaider (“to plead”), a legal word of the 19th century.^{[2][3][4][5][6][7]} The French verb continues Old French plaidier, from plait (“agreement, court”), perhaps through Vulgar Latin *placitō, from Latin placitum.^[1] Graur groups it with plăcea in the family of placeō (“to please”).^[8]

Its derivatives are pledant “pleading” and pledoarie “plea, pleading”;^[9] DER takes the noun from French plaidoirie, mixed with plaidoyer.^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is in Ion Heliade's translation of Byron's Don Juan, 1847, where the translator leaves Don Juan to plead for himself and for him: „las lui don Juan... cura de a pleda pentru sine şi pentru mine”.^[5][4][3]

Semantic evolution

The core sense is legal: to speak before a court for one of the parties, as an advocate.^[6][9] From it came “to argue for a cause or an idea”, and, said of facts and deeds, “to be an argument in favour of something”.^[5][3] Pontbriant in 1862 also gives “to be at law” and “to speak in someone's favour”, and Damé still marks it as a neologism in the 1890s.^[10][11] The phrase a pleda vinovat “to plead guilty”, after the procedure of other legal systems, is recent.^[12]

Timeline

• 1847 – first record, in Heliade's Don Juan.^[5][4][3]
• 1862 – Pontbriant's dictionary, with the legal senses.^[10]
• 1893–1895 – Damé marks it as a neologism.^[11]

Meanings

Verb

1. To plead: to speak before a court in defence of one of the parties, as an advocate.^[6][9]
2. To argue for a cause or an idea; to milita for something: a pleda pentru pace “to plead for peace”.^[6][3]
3. Of facts or deeds: to be an argument in favour of something.^[5][3]

Word family

• pledant
• pledoarie

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b 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. pleda
3. ^ 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, 415
4. ^ a b c Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. pledá
5. ^ 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. pledá
6. ^ a b c d DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 831
7. ^ Marcu, Florin (2000), Marele dicționar de neologisme, București: Saeculum Vizual, p. s.v. pleda
8. ^ Graur, Alexandru (1980), Cuvinte înrudite, București: Editura Științifică și Enciclopedică, p. 75
9. ^ a b c Macrea, Dimitrie; Petrovici, Emil (coord.) (1955–1957), Dicționarul limbii romîne literare contemporane, 4 vols., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 3, 460
10. ^ a b Pontbriant, Raoul de (1862), Dictiunaru romano-francesu, Bucuresci: A. Ulrich / Göttingen: Dieterich, p. 556
11. ^ a b Damé, Frédéric (1893–1895), Nouveau dictionnaire roumain-français, 4 vols., Bucarest: Imprimerie de l'État, p. s.v. pleda
12. ^ Dimitrescu, Florica (1997), Dicționar de cuvinte recente, 2nd ed., București: Logos (with the 3rd ed., 2013, in CLRE), p. s.v. pledá