pururi

Forms

pururi (adverb), also pururea^[1] The Psaltirea Hurmuzaki has pururile: „Păcatul mieu înaintea mea e pururile” “my sin is ever before me”.^[2] Pururea is the usual form of the old texts: Coresi writes „Dulci amu sunt pururea și de folos dumnezeieștile cuvinte” “the divine words are always sweet and useful”.^[3][4] Other old forms are purure and pururilea.^[3][5]

Etymology

Its origin is unknown.^[6][2] The Academy's dictionaries take it as probably inherited from Latin pūrus (“pure, clean”), an etymology Pușcariu proposed and the REW accepted with a question mark.^[1][5][6][7] Tiktin, followed by Wiktionary, derived it from Latin porrō (“further, onwards”), explaining the /u/ by the same change as in ușă from ostium and the ending by the adverbs aiurea and alminterea.^[3][8] Ciorănescu finds that explanation hard on phonetic grounds, and the REW rejects it.^[6][7]

Other proposals are a Slavic source (Cihac); perpetuālis (Körting), which Densusianu showed to be impossible; per hōra, through Albanian përherë (“always”) (Skok and Capidan), which Ciorănescu finds insufficient; and prōrsus (“straight on, altogether”) (Scriban).^[6][8]

Earliest recorded meaning

The word is first recorded in the Psaltirea Hurmuzaki of the early 16th century, as pururea and pururile, with the sense “always, continually”.^[5][4][2]

Semantic evolution

In the old texts the word means “without stopping, all the time” and “for ever”; it is frequent in church language, in the formula „acum și pururea” “now and ever”.^[2][3] The phrase de-a pururea “for ever” is old as well.^[3] Rare senses are “never”, in negative sentences, and, as a noun, “eternity”.^[5] Today it is dated or popular and survives mostly in poetry and set phrases: Eminescu's „Ce-n suflet pururi ai avut” “which you always had in your soul”.^[1][3]

Timeline

• c. 1500–1520 – pururea and pururile in the Psaltirea Hurmuzaki, the first records.^[5][4][2]
• 1570 – pururea throughout Coresi's psalter.^[4]
• c. 1573–1578 – pururea in the Psaltirea Scheiană.^[4][3]

Meanings

Adverb

1. (dated, popular) always, all the time, without interruption.^[1][8]
2. (dated, popular) For ever, eternally;^[1][5] de-a pururi “for ever”.^[1][5]

Related words

• Latin pūrus

References

1. ^ a b c d e f DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 900
2. ^ 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. pururi
3. ^ a b c d e f g Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. pururi
4. ^ a b c d e 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 15:8
5. ^ a b c d e f g Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 2, 605
6. ^ 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. pururi
7. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 6864
8. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org