porc

Forms

porc m (plural porci)^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin porcus (“pig”), a word found throughout Romance.^{[2][3][4][5][6][7][1]} Latin had it from Proto-Indo-European *pórḱos (“young pig”), perhaps originally “digger”; related words are Lithuanian par̃šas (“piglet”) and Old English fearh (“pig”).^[1][8]

The word survives in all four branches: Aromanian porcu, Megleno-Romanian porc and Istro-Romanian porc.^[2][9][10] Its Romance cognates include Dalmatian puarc, Italian porco, French porc, Catalan porc, Spanish puerco and Portuguese porco.^[2][7] The feminine porca (“sow”) survives as poarcă, now mostly the name of a children's game.^[2][11]

Earliest recorded meaning

Tiktin dates the first record to 1421.^[4] Personal names formed on the word are older still: Porcan is recorded in Transylvania in 1216.^[12] In Romanian texts the DLR's first quotation, from a text of about 1550, has „alții ca pieile porcilor” “others like the skins of pigs”;^[5][3] MDA2 dates the same text to about 1580.^[5][3] Coresi's Gospel has „o turmă de porci” “a herd of pigs”.^[5]

Semantic evolution

Besides the animal, the word means pork and, as an insult, a coarse, dirty or shameless man.^[13][14] Colloquially a blot of ink is a porc or purcel, a sense already in the Lexicon of Buda.^[4][15] It enters animal and plant names: porc mistreț or porc sălbatic “wild boar”, porc ghimpos “porcupine”, porcușor for the gudgeon and the dotterel.^[4][13]

Porcoi, porcan and porșor also mean a small heap of hay;^[4][11][16] Pușcariu derived this sense from Latin porca (“ridge between furrows”), but Tiktin finds that form and meaning speak against it, and Candrea and Densusianu compare other Romance dialects in which a word for “piglet” also names a heap of hay.^[4][11][16]

Timeline

• 1421 – the first record cited by Tiktin.^[4]
• 1437 – Sandrea Porcul, a personal name.^[12]
• c. 1550 – „pieile porcilor” in a text of the Cuvente den bătrâni (dated c. 1580 by MDA2).^[5][3]
• 1648 – porcilor “before the swine” in the New Testament of 1648.^[5]
• 1688 – porc and porci in the Bucharest Bible.^[17]
• 1825 – porcu “ink blot” in the Lexicon of Buda.^[15]

Meanings

Noun

1. A pig: the domestic omnivorous mammal with a conical head and a long snout, raised for its meat and fat (Sus scrofa domestica); porc sălbatic or porc mistreț “wild boar”.^[13][3]
2. pork.^[13][1]
3. (insulting) A coarse, dirty or shameless man.^[13][18]

Word family

• poarcă
• porcar
• porcăraș
• porcărie
• porcesc
• porcește
• porci
• porcină
• porcos
• porcușor
• porșor
• porcăreață

Related words

• purcea
• purcel
• Aromanian porcu
• Latin porcus

Usage notes

Compounds include porc-spinos (or porc-ghimpos) “porcupine” and porc-de-mare, a black sea fish with venomous spines (Scorpaena scrofa).^[13] A mâna porcii la jir “to drive the pigs to the beech mast” means “to snore loudly”.^[13][4]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d 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. porc
3. ^ a b c d e Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 2, 470
4. ^ a b c d e f g h Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. porc
5. ^ a b c d e f Academia Română (1965–2010), Dicționarul limbii române (DLR), serie nouă, tom I–XIX, București: Editura Academiei Române, p. s.v. porc
6. ^ Pușcariu, Sextil (1905), Etymologisches Wörterbuch der rumänischen Sprache I: Lateinisches Element, Heidelberg: Carl Winter, p. 119
7. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 6666
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. ^ Papahagi, Tache (1963), Dicționarul dialectului aromân, general și etimologic, București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 872
10. ^ Kovačec, August (1998), Istrorumunjsko-hrvatski rječnik (s gramatikom i tekstovima), Pula
11. ^ a b c Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 6657
12. ^ a b Constantinescu, N. A. (1963), Dicționar onomastic romînesc, București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne
13. ^ a b c d e f g DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 850
14. ^ Scriban, August (1939), Dicționaru limbii românești (etimologii, înțelesuri, exemple, citațiuni, arhaizme, neologizme, provincializme), Iași: Presa Bună, p. 1018
15. ^ a b Lesicon românescu-latinescu-ungurescu-nemțescu quare de mai mulți autori, în cursul a trideci și mai multor ani s-au lucrat (1825), Buda: Typographia Universității (the Lexicon of Buda, ed. Petru Maior et al.), p. 525
16. ^ a b Candrea, I.-A.; Densusianu, Ov. (1907–1914), Dicționarul etimologic al limbii române: elementele latine (A–Putea), București, p. s.v. porc
17. ^ Biblia, adecă Dumnezeiasca Scriptură a ceii vechi și a ceii noao leage, București, 1688 (ed. 1988, tricentennial edition), p. Isaiah 65:4
18. ^ Volceanov, George (2007), Dicționar de argou al limbii române, București: Niculescu, p. s.v. porc