produce

Forms

produce (present produc, third-person singular produce, past participle produs, subjunctive să producă), third conjugation^[1][2]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin prōdūcō (“to lead forth, bring forth”), with some senses after French produire.^[3][2][4] Tiktin also takes it from Latin, partly through other languages.^[5] Ciorănescu derives it from the French verb, fitted to the conjugation of duce.^[6] The neologism dictionaries give Latin and compare French.^[7]

The Latin verb is formed from prō (“forward”) and dūcō (“to lead”).^[8] The French verb was borrowed from it in 1340 and reshaped after verbs such as French conduire.^[8][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Tiktin dates the first record to 1805.^[5] The first quotation in MDA2 and DLR, from Naum Petrovici's pedagogy book of 1818, has the legal and school sense “to show as proof”: „Sholarii trebuie acuma să producă, adecă să areate scrisorile” “the pupils must now produce, that is, show their papers”.^[3][4]

Semantic evolution

Besides this sense, which it shares with French, the verb took “to cause, bring about”, recorded from 1846, and then “to make, manufacture” and “to yield, bear fruit”.^[3][2] Negulici in 1848 glossed it “to bear, give birth to, cause”,^[9] and Pontbriant in 1862 “to make, manufacture” and “to bring in a profit”.^[10] The reflexive took two senses: “to take place, happen” and “to perform before an audience”.^[3][2]

It is conjugated like duce, with the past participle produs.^[6][9] The old texts also had a rare form producălui.^[5][3]

Timeline

• 1805 – the first record Tiktin gives.^[5]
• 1818 – “to present as proof” in Naum Petrovici's pedagogy book.^[4][3]
• 1846 – “to cause, bring about”.^[3]
• 1848 – in Negulici's dictionary of neologisms.^[9]
• 1862 – “to make, manufacture; to bring in” in Pontbriant.^[10]

Meanings

Verb

1. To produce, create or make goods or scientific and artistic works; in a narrower sense, to manufacture.^[2][4]
2. Of land and plants, to bear fruit, to yield.^[2][4]
3. To bring in a profit or an income.^[2][4]
4. To cause, give rise to: Vestea i-a produs o mare bucurie. “The news brought him great joy.”^[2][4]
5. (reflexive) Of events, to take place, to happen.^[2][4]
6. (reflexive) To perform before an audience.^[2][4]
7. (formal) To present, show as evidence.^[2][4]

Word family

• producător
• product
• produs
• neproductiv
• productivitate
• reproduce

Usage notes

A regional homograph produce “to carry again”, recorded in a folklore archive of 1932, is formed from pro- and duce.^[4][3][11]

References

1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 880
3. ^ a b c d e f g h Academia Română (1965–2010), Dicționarul limbii române (DLR), serie nouă, tom I–XIX, București: Editura Academiei Române, p. s.v. produce
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 2, 560
5. ^ a b c d Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. produce
6. ^ 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. produce
7. ^ Marcu, Florin; Maneca, Constant (1986), Dicționar de neologisme, 3rd ed., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Socialiste România, p. s.v. produce
8. ^ a b Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
9. ^ a b c Negulici, I. D. (1848), Vocabular romînesc de toate vorbele streine întroduse pînă acum în limba romînească și de toate cuvintele ce s-ar mai putea introduce încă, București, p. s.v. produce
10. ^ a b Pontbriant, Raoul de (1862), Dictiunaru romano-francesu, Bucuresci: A. Ulrich / Göttingen: Dieterich, p. 588
11. ^ Bulgăr, Gheorghe; Constantinescu-Dobridor, Gheorghe (2002), Dicționar de arhaisme și regionalisme, 2 vols., București: Saeculum Vizual, p. s.v. produce