sărbătoare

Forms

sărbătoare f (plural sărbători)^[1] The Psaltirea Scheiană has the spelling sărbotoare at Psalm 73.^[2] Old variants listed by MDA2 are sărbotoare and serbătoare; the Lexicon de la Buda of 1825 prints Sẻrbảtóre.^[3][4]

Etymology

It is formed from Romanian serba + -ătoare, from the verb in its variant sărba “to celebrate”, according to MDA2, DEX and the DLR.^[3][5][6] Ciorănescu explains it as the past participle serbat with the suffix -oare, as in scăldătoare.^[7] The verb serba continues servō (“to keep, observe”).^[7][1]

Densusianu and Pascu instead reconstruct a Vulgar Latin *servatoria, and Tiktin and Wiktionary give both views.^[7][8][1] The noun has cognates south of the Danube: Aromanian sãrbãtoari and Megleno-Romanian sîrbătoare.^[7][9]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first records are in the 16th-century psalters: Coresi's psalter of 1570 has the word at Psalm 117, in a verse on bringing a feast up to the horn of the altar.^[10][6] MDA2 and Tiktin give the Psaltirea Scheiană of about 1573–1578.^[3][8] The sense was a religious feast day from the start: Coresi writes that holidays were established so that people would attend to the service of God and the care of the soul.^[6]

Semantic evolution

The DLR's quotations of the 16th and 17th centuries are all religious: the Feast of Unleavened Bread in the New Testament of 1648, the order of the feasts in a document of 1675.^[6] The general sense, a day on which any event or person is celebrated, and a day off work came later, and in the plural the word names the season around Christmas, New Year or Easter.^[3][5] Modern set phrases include sărbătoare legală “public holiday” and sărbătoare națională “national day”.^[5] Tiktin records the proverb Baba călătoare n-are sărbătoare “the travelling old woman has no holiday”: on a journey one takes what one is offered.^[8] The word also became a personal name, recorded in 16th-century documents.^[11]

Timeline

• 1570 – sărbătoare in Coresi's psalter (Psalm 117).^[10]
• c. 1573-1578 – sărbotoare in the Psaltirea Scheiană.^[2][3]
• 1648 – sărbătoarea azimelor “the feast of unleavened bread” in the New Testament of 1648.^[6]
• 1688 – frequent in the Bucharest Bible.^[12]
• 1825 – Sẻrbảtóre “feast day” in the Lexicon de la Buda.^[4]

Meanings

Noun

1. A holiday or celebration: a solemn occasion and the day given to it; a day on which no work is done: sărbătoare legală “public holiday”, de sărbătoare “festive”.^[5][3][1]
2. A day of divine service marking a religious event or honouring a saint;^[5][3] sărbătorile, the Christmas or Easter season: Ne vedem după sărbători.^[5][3]

Word family

• sărbători
• sărbătoresc

Related words

• serba
• Aromanian sãrbãtoari

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b 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 73:5
3. ^ a b c d e f g h Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 2, 777
4. ^ 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. 634
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. 981
6. ^ 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. sărbătoare
7. ^ 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. serba
8. ^ a b c Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. sărbătoare
9. ^ Cunia, Tiberius (2008), Dictsiunar a limbãljei armãneascã, Editsii Timpurarã (after T. Papahagi, Ș. Mihăileanu and I. Dalametra; online at dixionline.net), p. 898
10. ^ a b 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 117:26
11. ^ Constantinescu, N. A. (1963), Dicționar onomastic romînesc, București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. s.v. sărbătoare
12. ^ Biblia, adecă Dumnezeiasca Scriptură a ceii vechi și a ceii noao leage, București, 1688 (ed. 1988, tricentennial edition), p. Psalm 117:26