rugăminte

Forms

rugăminte f (plural rugăminți)^[1] The older plural rugăminte appears in Horace's translation by Ollănescu: „fură uciși, cu toate rugămintele lui Proculeiu” “they were killed, for all Proculeius's pleas”.^[2][3] An old neuter singular rugământ is recorded in Dosoftei's Lives of the Saints.^[2][4]

Etymology

It is formed from Romanian ruga (“to ask, to pray”) + -ământ, according to DEX and NODEX;^[5][6][4][1] MDA2 starts from the noun rugă with the same suffix.^[5][6][4][1] Ciorănescu and Tiktin explain the feminine form: the old neuter rugământ was used mostly in the plural, which had the same form as today's singular, and this plural was then taken as a feminine singular, as happened with încălțăminte and îmbrăcăminte.^[7][2]

Pușcariu derived it directly from Latin rogāmentum (“a question”), a rare post-classical word, and Scriban and Șăineanu give the Latin word as its source too.^{[7][8][9][10]} The Latin noun is formed on rogō (“to ask”), the source of the Romanian verb.^[1] Megleno-Romanian rugămint corresponds to the old Romanian singular.^[7][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Tiktin's first record is Eustratie's Pravila of 1632, and MDA2's is Varlaam's Cazania of 1643, with the sense “a request”.^[2][4] A 17th-century manuscript tells how „Domnul Radul Vodă … au trimis cu rugăminte la acest svânt părinte ca să vie în țara lui” “Prince Radu sent a request to this holy father to come to his country”.^[2]

Semantic evolution

The noun names an earnest or polite request made to someone, and MDA2 also gives the sense “prayer”.^[4][5][6] Its synonyms are rugare, rugă and rugăciune; the last is now the usual word for a prayer.^[4][5]

The Lexicon of Buda (1825) lists it as rugămente or rogămente beside rugare, with the Latin equivalents preces, rogatio, petitio and rogamentum.^[11]

Timeline

• 1632 – first record, in Eustratie's Pravila.^[2]
• 1643 – in Varlaam's Cazania.^[4]
• 1825 – rugămente, rogămente in the Lexicon of Buda.^[11]

Meanings

Noun

1. A request, often an insistent one, made to someone to obtain something; a plea: Am o rugăminte: închide, te rog, fereastra.^[5][4][1]
2. A prayer.^[4]

Related words

• ruga
• rugă
• rugăciune
• Megleno-Romanian rugămint

Usage notes

The plural is rugăminți; older writers also used rugăminte.^[5][3][2]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ 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. rugăminte
3. ^ a b Macrea, Dimitrie; Petrovici, Emil (coord.) (1955–1957), Dicționarul limbii romîne literare contemporane, 4 vols., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 3, 784
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 2, 733
5. ^ a b c d e f DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 966
6. ^ a b c Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2002), Noul dicționar explicativ al limbii române, București: Litera Internațional, p. s.v. rugăminte
7. ^ a b c 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. ruga
8. ^ Scriban, August (1939), Dicționaru limbii românești (etimologii, înțelesuri, exemple, citațiuni, arhaizme, neologizme, provincializme), Iași: Presa Bună, p. 1141
9. ^ Șăineanu, Lazăr (1929), Dicționar universal al limbei române, 6th ed., Craiova: Scrisul Românesc, p. 556
10. ^ Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
11. ^ 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. 596