saluta

Forms

saluta (third-person singular present salută, past participle salutat, third-person subjunctive salute) 1st conjugation^[1] The first records spell it săluta: Theodor Aaron wrote „În limba grecească m-au sălutat” “in the Greek language they greeted me”.^[2][3] An old present salutez is recorded beside the usual salut.^[3]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin salūtō (“to greet”), a learned loan of the 19th century, and at the same time borrowed from Italian salutare.^{[4][3][2][1][5]} Marcu & Maneca also compare French saluer.^[6] The Latin verb is formed on salūs (“health, safety”).^[7]

The Latin verb had already passed into Romanian by inheritance as săruta, which in the old language meant “to greet” and now means “to kiss”, and the borrowed verb is its learned doublet.^[8][1] The inherited verb survives south of the Danube as well: Aromanian săruta (“to greet”).^[9][8] Its Romance cognates include Sardinian saludare, Spanish saludar and Portuguese saudar.^[9]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is in Theodor Aaron's short appendix to Petru Maior's history, printed at Buda in 1828, in the form sălutat “greeted”, which the author explains with the native phrase au dat bineţe.^[3][2]

Semantic evolution

In the first decades the verb still needed a gloss, and its first vowel wavered (a vă săluta in Vida's grammar).^[2] From the mid-19th century it is common in the literary language, in Negruzzi, Ghica, Alecsandri, Eminescu and Caragiale, of greeting someone by a word or a gesture.^[2] It was also used of troops presenting arms, and Pontbriant (1862) glosses it as raising one's hat.^[10][2] The figurative sense “to welcome an idea or an event with enthusiasm” followed.^[4][6]

Șăineanu's dictionary also lists the senses “to send greetings in writing” and “to hail someone as ruler”.^[11]

Timeline

• 1828 – sălutat in Theodor Aaron's appendix to Petru Maior's history, the first record.^[3][2]
• 1848 – Negulici's dictionary of neologisms has salutare “to bow, pay a compliment”.^[12]
• 1862 – Pontbriant gives saluta with the Latin model and the French gloss saluer.^[10]
• 1869 – Barițiu uses saluta to render several Hungarian verbs of greeting.^[13]

Meanings

Verb

1. To greet someone with a gesture or a polite formula on meeting or parting; reflexive reciprocal: to greet each other.^[4][1]
2. To hail or cheer someone, showing one's joy.^[4][3]
3. (figurative) To welcome an idea or an action with enthusiasm.^[4][5]

Related words

• săruta
• salut
• Latin salūtō

Usage notes

Vă salut! is a common formula of greeting and parting.^[2] The related noun is salut, and DLR lists regional synonyms of the verb such as a noroci.^[2]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i Academia Română (1965–2010), Dicționarul limbii române (DLR), serie nouă, tom I–XIX, București: Editura Academiei Române, p. s.v. saluta
3. ^ a b c d e f Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 2, 751
4. ^ a b c d e DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 973
5. ^ a b Marcu, Florin (2000), Marele dicționar de neologisme, București: Saeculum Vizual
6. ^ a b Marcu, Florin; Maneca, Constant (1986), Dicționar de neologisme, 3rd ed., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Socialiste România
7. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ 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. săruta
9. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 7556
10. ^ a b Pontbriant, Raoul de (1862), Dictiunaru romano-francesu, Bucuresci: A. Ulrich / Göttingen: Dieterich, p. 646
11. ^ Șăineanu, Lazăr (1929), Dicționar universal al limbei române, 6th ed., Craiova: Scrisul Românesc, p. 1, 561
12. ^ 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. salutare
13. ^ Barițiu, George (1869), Dictionariu unguresc-romanescu, Brașov, p. 598