psihic

Forms

psihic m or n (feminine singular psihică, masculine plural psihici, feminine/neuter plural psihice)^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from German psychisch, with French psychique as a second source: DEX, MDA2, MDN and the DLR give both, DN only French.^{[2][3][4][5][6][1]} Scriban derived it straight from Greek.^[7]

The German adjective, used from about 1800, is formed on Psyche (“soul”).^[8][9] The French word, from 1557, is borrowed from Late Latin psychicus, a word of the early Christian writers, from Ancient Greek ψυχικός (psukhikós, “of life or the soul”), a derivative of ψυχή (psukhḗ, “breath, life, soul”).^[10][8]

Earliest recorded meaning

MDA2's first record is a translation by Albineț, published in 1838, of Sobernheim's book on preserving health, the Macroviotica.^[3] There the word is an adjective: “psychic influences” („înrâuriri psihice”) affect the skin.^[5]

Semantic evolution

The adjective “of the soul or the mind” came first;^[5][11] Damé (1893) gives fenomene psihice “psychic phenomena”.^[5][11] Gherea wrote of adâncirea psihică a persoanelor “the psychological depth of the characters” in a play.^[5]

The neuter noun psihicul “the psyche, a person's mental make-up” is used by Ionescu-Rion in a remark on Eminescu.^[12] Dictionaries of the 1950s–1980s define it in the terms of materialist psychology, as the property of highly organized matter to reflect reality;^[12][13][2] DEX 2009 keeps only the sense “mental make-up”.^[12][13][2]

Timeline

• 1838 – înrâuriri psihice “psychic influences” in Albineț's translation, the first record.^[3][5]
• 1893 – in Damé's dictionary.^[11]
• 1929 – Șăineanu defines it as relating to the soul and the intellectual and moral faculties.^[14]
• 1939 – Scriban records the neuter noun and the adverb psihicamente.^[7]

Meanings

Noun

1. The psyche: the mental and emotional make-up of a person.^[2][3]
2. (psychology) The mind as the reflection of reality produced by the nervous system in humans and higher animals, and the whole of the processes through which it works.^[13][4]

Adjective

1. psychic, mental: of or relating to the psyche.^[2][1]

Related words

• psihiatru
• psihologie
• psihoză
• French psychique
• German psychisch

References

1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 893
3. ^ a b c d Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 2, 586
4. ^ a b Marcu, Florin (2000), Marele dicționar de neologisme, București: Saeculum Vizual, p. s.v. psihic
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. psihic
6. ^ Marcu, Florin; Maneca, Constant (1986), Dicționar de neologisme, 3rd ed., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Socialiste România, p. s.v. psihic
7. ^ a b Scriban, August (1939), Dicționaru limbii românești (etimologii, înțelesuri, exemple, citațiuni, arhaizme, neologizme, provincializme), Iași: Presa Bună
8. ^ a b Pfeifer, Wolfgang, et al. (1993), Etymologisches Wörterbuch des Deutschen, 2nd ed., Berlin: Akademie-Verlag; digital revised version in the DWDS, dwds.de
9. ^ Kluge, Friedrich; Seebold, Elmar (2011), Etymologisches Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache, 25th ed., Berlin / Boston: De Gruyter
10. ^ Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
11. ^ a b c Damé, Frédéric (1893–1895), Nouveau dictionnaire roumain-français, 4 vols., Bucarest: Imprimerie de l'État
12. ^ 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, 615
13. ^ a b c Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan” (1998), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române, 2nd ed., București: Univers Enciclopedic, p. 866
14. ^ Șăineanu, Lazăr (1929), Dicționar universal al limbei române, 6th ed., Craiova: Scrisul Românesc, p. 1, 522