separa

Forms

separa (third-person singular present separă, past participle separat, third-person subjunctive separe), first conjugation^[1] The first person present is separ; an older separez is also recorded.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is borrowed from French séparer, with Latin sēparō (“to set apart”) as a second model, as DEX, MDA2 and the DLR give it; the DN adds Italian separare.^{[3][2][4][5][1]} French borrowed it from Latin in 1314; the Latin verb is formed from sē-, marking separation, and parō (“to prepare, arrange”).^[6] The same Latin verb gave French sevrer (“to wean”) by inheritance.^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

The DLR's first quotation, from an undated Învățătură, glosses the new word with the native one: „Au separat, adecă au despărțit vitele cele bolnave de cele sănătoase” “they separated, that is parted, the sick cattle from the healthy”.^[4][2]

Semantic evolution

Dictionaries of the mid-19th century, such as Pontbriant's (1862), still sent the reader to the native despărți.^[7] The DLR quotes it from the 1880s on in the abstract sense of a boundary or difference, as when reflection separates human from animal intelligence.^[4] Reflexive senses followed: of people parting, of spouses separating or divorcing, and in physics of a dissolved solid settling as a precipitate.^[3][2]

Meanings

Verb

1. (transitive) To separate, part, isolate; to divide into parts.^[3][2][1]
2. (reflexive, of people) To part from someone;^[8] (of spouses) to separate or divorce.^[3][2]
3. (reflexive and intransitive, physics, of a dissolved solid) To settle as a precipitate.^[3][8]
4. (transitive) To distinguish, set apart from someone or something.^[2][4]

Word family

• separare
• separat
• separație
• separator

Related words

• despărți
• French séparer

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ 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, 861
3. ^ a b c d e f DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 1006
4. ^ a b c d Academia Română (1965–2010), Dicționarul limbii române (DLR), serie nouă, tom I–XIX, București: Editura Academiei Române, p. s.v. separa
5. ^ Marcu, Florin; Maneca, Constant (1986), Dicționar de neologisme, 3rd ed., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Socialiste România, p. s.v. separa
6. ^ Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
7. ^ Pontbriant, Raoul de (1862), Dictiunaru romano-francesu, Bucuresci: A. Ulrich / Göttingen: Dieterich, p. 669
8. ^ a b Marcu, Florin (2000), Marele dicționar de neologisme, București: Saeculum Vizual, p. s.v. separa