tăcere

Forms

tăcere f (plural tăceri)^[1] Old texts write tăceare: Dosoftei says of a saint that he kept much fasting, vigil „și tăceare” “and silence”.^[2]

Etymology

It is the long infinitive of tăcea (“to be silent”), formed from Romanian tăcea + -re, as Ciorănescu, Tiktin, MDA2 and the DLR derive it.^[3][2][4][5] The verb is from Latin taceō (“to be silent”), and Wiktionary also connects the noun directly with the Latin infinitive.^[3][1][6]

The verb survives in all four branches: Aromanian tac, Megleno-Romanian tac and Istro-Romanian tǫcu, and the infinitive nouns tãtseari and tățeari match the Romanian one.^[3][1] The Romance cognates of the verb include Dalmatian takar, Italian tacere, Old Occitan tazer and French taire.^[3][6]

Earliest recorded meaning

Tiktin dates the first record to about 1560, in a collection of religious extracts that Mareș described in 1980.^[2] MDA2 gives Coresi's Carte de învățătură of 1581.^[4] In both the sense is the state of not speaking.^[4][2]

Semantic evolution

From the state of a person who says nothing the word passed to the absence of all noise, the quiet of a place or of the night: în tăcerea nopții.^[2][5][7] Old phrases were a sta în tăcere or a sta cu tăcere “to keep silent”, used in Dosoftei's verse psalter, and a face tăcere “to make silence, call for quiet”.^[2][4] A pause in a conversation or a break in a correspondence is also a tăcere, and figuratively the word names indifference and the lack of any activity.^[8][7]

A trece sub tăcere “to pass over in silence” had an older form a trece cu tăcerea.^[2][4] Used alone, Tăcere! is a call for silence.^[9][10]

Timeline

• c. 1560 – first record, in a collection of religious extracts.^[2]
• 1581 – tăcere in Coresi's Carte de învățătură.^[4]
• 1801 – tacére glossed Latin silentium and taciturnitas in Klein's dictionary.^[11]
• 1825 – the Lexicon de la Buda gives “silence” and also “discretion”.^[12]
• 1870 – a păzi tăcerea “to keep silence” in Costinescu.^[13]

Meanings

Noun

1. silence: the fact of keeping silent, of not speaking; by extension quiet, calm, the absence of noise.^[7][1] În tăcere: without a word; without confiding in anyone.^[7][1]
2. A long pause in a conversation; a break in a correspondence.^[7][4]
3. (figurative) indifference.^[7]
4. (figurative) The lack of any activity or expression; apathy.^[7][14]

Related words

• tăcea
• tăcut
• taciturn
• tacit

Usage notes

A trece ceva sub tăcere means “to pass something over, to leave it out on purpose”.^[7][14]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. tăcere
3. ^ 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. tăcea
4. ^ 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, 1165
5. ^ a b Academia Română (1965–2010), Dicționarul limbii române (DLR), serie nouă, tom I–XIX, București: Editura Academiei Române, p. s.v. tăcere
6. ^ a b Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 8517
7. ^ a b c d e f g h DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 1106
8. ^ Macrea, Dimitrie; Petrovici, Emil (coord.) (1955–1957), Dicționarul limbii romîne literare contemporane, 4 vols., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 4, 391
9. ^ Scriban, August (1939), Dicționaru limbii românești (etimologii, înțelesuri, exemple, citațiuni, arhaizme, neologizme, provincializme), Iași: Presa Bună, p. 1301
10. ^ Șăineanu, Lazăr (1929), Dicționar universal al limbei române, 6th ed., Craiova: Scrisul Românesc, p. 635
11. ^ Gáldi, László (ed.) (1944), Samuel Klein: Dictionarium valachico-latinum. Primul dicționar al limbii române, Budapest: Királyi Magyar Pázmány Péter Tudományegyetemi Román Intézet (Klein's dictionary of 1801, with Gáldi's etymological study), p. 454
12. ^ 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. 693
13. ^ Costinescu, Ion (1870), Vocabularu romano-francesu, 2 vols., Bucuresci, p. 2, 593
14. ^ a b Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2002), Noul dicționar explicativ al limbii române, București: Litera Internațional, p. s.v. tăcere