ploaie

Forms

ploaie f (plural ploi)^[1] Regional forms are ploauă and plouă.^[2]

Etymology

It is inherited from Vulgar Latin *plovia (“rain”), a popular form of Latin pluvia.^{[3][2][4][5][1]} The REW and Candrea and Densusianu start from a reduced form *ploia;^[6][7] Ciorănescu, following Pascu, holds that a Latin reduction to that form could not have given the Romanian word.^[3]

It survives in all four branches: Aromanian ploai, Megleno-Romanian ploaiă and Istro-Romanian ploie.^[3][1] The Romance cognates include Italian pioggia, Occitan ploia, French pluie, Spanish lluvia and Portuguese chuva.^[3][6] It belongs with the verb ploua, from a popular Latin form of pluō (“to rain”).^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is in the Psaltirea Hurmuzaki of the early 16th century: ploaia in Psalm 71:6.^[8][2] Tiktin cites the Psaltirea Scheiană (Psalm 67:10).^[5]

Semantic evolution

Besides rain itself, the word came to mean a single raindrop and, by analogy, anything that falls or pours in great quantity: o ploaie de săgeți “a shower of arrows”, ploaie de stele “a meteor shower”.^[4][5][2] Hunters used it for the fine shot used on birds.^[4][5]

Folk speech distinguishes kinds of rain, such as ploi mocănești, a fine and lasting rain.^[5][2] The proverb după ploaie, chepeneag “a cloak after the rain” is said of help that comes too late, and MDA2 gives it as după ploaie manta.^[5][2] Familiar speech has apă de ploaie “rainwater” for empty talk and a-și aranja ploile for arranging things in one's own favour.^[4][2]

Timeline

• early 16th century – ploaia in the Psaltirea Hurmuzaki, the first record.^[8][2]
• 1570 – in Coresi's psalter.^[8]
• 1573–1578 – ploaie in the Psaltirea Scheiană.^[5]

Meanings

Noun

1. rain: precipitation falling as drops of water condensed from vapour in the air.^[4][1] Pe ploaie “while it rains”, în ploaie “out in the rain”.^[4][2][1]
2. A raindrop.^[2] By analogy, something that falls or comes in great quantity: ploaie de stele “a meteor shower”.^[4][2]
3. Fine shot for hunting birds and small game.^[4][5]

Word family

• ploiță
• ploicică

Related words

• ploua
• Aromanian ploai
• Latin pluvia

Usage notes

The plural is ploi, the genitive ploii.^[2][1] Diminutives are ploiță, ploicică and ploișoară.^[5][3]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 2, 423
3. ^ 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. ploua
4. ^ 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. 834
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. ploaie
6. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 6620
7. ^ Candrea, I.-A.; Densusianu, Ov. (1907–1914), Dicționarul etimologic al limbii române: elementele latine (A–Putea), București, p. 230
8. ^ a b c 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 71:6