traduce

Forms

• a traduce (present traduc, third person traduce, past participle tradus), third conjugation^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin trādūcō (“to lead across”) and at the same time borrowed from French traduire.^[2][3][4][1] Ciorănescu takes it from Latin in the 19th century and notes that it is conjugated like duce;^[5] Tiktin calls it a New Latin borrowing, also taken through other languages.^[6][7] The Latin verb is formed on trāns- and dūcō (“to lead”) and meant “to bring across, transfer”.^[5] French borrowed it in 1480, in the sense “to carry over from one language into another”.^[8] The REW lists Italian tradurre, Spanish traducir and Portuguese traduzir “to translate” under the Latin verb as learned words.^[9]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is the participle in a title of 1794, „O istoriolă adevărată..., tradusă de pre alte limbi” “a true little story, translated from other languages”.^[4][3] Tiktin's first date is about 1805, in Șincai, who also used it in the older sense “to transfer”.^[7]

Semantic evolution

The sense “translate” was there from the start, and it replaced older words for the task: tălmăci, tâlcui and the obsolete întraduce.^[4][3] Laurian and Massim also gave the Latin senses “to bring forward, expose to ridicule” and “to summon to court”, of which the legal phrase a traduce în fața justiției survives.^[10][2] Figuratively it means to render something by other means, as art renders a feeling, and in a traduce în viață to put a plan into practice; in engineering it is the transformation of one quantity into another.^[2][11] In colloquial speech it means “to cheat on a partner”.^[6][12]

Timeline

• 1794 – tradusă “translated” in a title, the first record.^[4][3]
• c. 1805 – in Șincai.^[7]
• c. 1817 – „traducându-le în limba pământeană” “translating them into the language of the land” in a text in the Uricariul.^[4]
• 1848 – listed by Negulici as traduccere “to translate”.^[13]
• 1862 – Pontbriant renders it French traduire, expliquer.^[14]
• 1871–1876 – Laurian and Massim add “to summon to court”.^[10]

Meanings

Verb

1. To translate a word, sentence or text from one language into another; specifically, to restore a telegraphic text from the received signals.^[2][3]
2. (figurative) To render or express something by other means, especially by art.^[2]
3. (figurative) To carry out, put into practice: a traduce în viață un plan;^[12] (reflexive) to show itself, result in: Criza s-a tradus prin scumpiri.^[2]
4. (technology) To transform a quantity of one kind into a quantity of another kind.^[2]
5. a traduce (pe cineva) în fața justiției “to bring someone before a court”.^[2]
6. (colloquial) To cheat on, be unfaithful to a partner; to deceive.^[6][12]

Word family

• traducere
• traducător
• traductibil
• intraductibil

Related words

• duce
• tălmăci
• translator

References

1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ 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. 1135
3. ^ a b c d e Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 2, 1248
4. ^ 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. traduce
5. ^ a b Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
6. ^ 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. traduce
7. ^ 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. traduce
8. ^ Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
9. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. s.v. tradūcere
10. ^ a b Laurian, A. T.; Massim, I. C. (1871–1876), Dictionariulu limbei romane, 2 vols., Bucuresci: Noua Typographia a Laboratoriloru Romani, p. s.v. traduce
11. ^ Marcu, Florin; Maneca, Constant (1986), Dicționar de neologisme, 3rd ed., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Socialiste România, p. s.v. traduce
12. ^ a b c Volceanov, George (2007), Dicționar de argou al limbii române, București: Niculescu, p. s.v. traduce
13. ^ 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
14. ^ Pontbriant, Raoul de (1862), Dictiunaru romano-francesu, Bucuresci: A. Ulrich / Göttingen: Dieterich, p. 745