tunel

Forms

tunel n (plural tuneluri or tunele)^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from French tunnel, and the MDA2, Tiktin, the DLR, NODEX and Marcu also name borrowed from German Tunnel as a source.^{[2][3][4][5][6][7]} Marcu & Maneca give French and English tunnel instead, and Negulici labelled it an English word in 1848.^[8][9]

French took the word in 1825 from English, as a civil-engineering term for the works under the Thames directed by the French engineer M. I. Brunel; it spread as a railway term from 1829.^[10] The English word first named a tubular net for catching birds, then a pipe, and since the 18th century an underground passage; it comes from Old French tonel (“cask, barrel”), an older form of tonneau and tonnelle.^[10][11] The French word is thus a reborrowing, a doublet of that older word..^[1] The German word was taken from English in the 1820s too, and Kluge traces the Old French word to Gaulish tunna.^[11][12]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record, in 1829, describes the Thames tunnel: „Arhitectul podului numit tunel (un drum zidit pe supt râul Tamisa)” “the architect of the bridge called a tunnel (a road built under the river Thames)”.^[5][4][3] A definition of 1838 already gives the general sense: a way that leads through a mountain or under a river to the other side.^[5]

Semantic evolution

Negulici's dictionary of neologisms (1848) defines it as an underground passage under a mountain or a river, and Costinescu (1870) as a vaulted digging under the ground with two mouths.^[9][13] In the following decades it became above all a railway word: Scriban defines it as a gallery dug for trains.^[14][5]

Scriban and the MDA2 also record a beer hall or tavern laid out as a long gallery in a basement, a sense now rare.^[14][3][15] Writers used it figuratively for an arch of leaves, tuneluri de verdeață “tunnels of greenery”.^[5] Technical terms followed: tunel aerodinamic “wind tunnel”, the efect de tunel of physics and an anatomical sense, a passage through which other structures run.^[3][8]

Timeline

• 1829 – tunel for the tunnel under the Thames, the first record.^[5][4]
• 1838 – a definition: a way through a mountain or under a river.^[5]
• 1848 – tunnel in Negulici's dictionary, marked as an English word.^[9]
• 1870 – tunelŭ in Costinescu's dictionary.^[13]
• 1939 – Scriban records the sense “tavern in a basement gallery”.^[14]

Meanings

Noun

1. A tunnel: an underground gallery through a mountain or hill, or under the ground or a body of water, serving as a way of communication.^[2][3]
2. tunel aerodinamic: a wind tunnel, an installation for testing models of aircraft and wings in a current of air.^[3][8]
3. (physics) efect de tunel: the tunnelling of a particle through a potential barrier higher than its energy.^[3][7]
4. (anatomy) A space or canal through which certain structures pass.^[3][8]
5. (rare) A tavern or beer hall laid out as a gallery, usually in a basement.^[3][14]

Related words

• French tunnel

Usage notes

The plural is tuneluri, less often tunele.^[2][4] Railway workers say turnel.^[3]

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 1153
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 2, 1299
4. ^ a b c d Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. tunel
5. ^ a b c d e f g Academia Română (1965–2010), Dicționarul limbii române (DLR), serie nouă, tom I–XIX, București: Editura Academiei Române, p. s.v. tunel
6. ^ Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2002), Noul dicționar explicativ al limbii române, București: Litera Internațional, p. s.v. tunel
7. ^ a b Marcu, Florin (2000), Marele dicționar de neologisme, București: Saeculum Vizual, p. s.v. tunel
8. ^ a b c d Marcu, Florin; Maneca, Constant (1986), Dicționar de neologisme, 3rd ed., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Socialiste România, p. s.v. tunel
9. ^ a b c 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. tunel
10. ^ a b Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
11. ^ a b Pfeifer, Wolfgang, et al. (1993), Etymologisches Wörterbuch des Deutschen, 2nd ed., Berlin: Akademie-Verlag; digital revised version in the DWDS, dwds.de
12. ^ Kluge, Friedrich; Seebold, Elmar (2011), Etymologisches Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache, 25th ed., Berlin / Boston: De Gruyter, p. 935
13. ^ a b Costinescu, Ion (1870), Vocabularu romano-francesu, 2 vols., Bucuresci, p. 2, 648
14. ^ a b c d Scriban, August (1939), Dicționaru limbii românești (etimologii, înțelesuri, exemple, citațiuni, arhaizme, neologizme, provincializme), Iași: Presa Bună, p. 1355
15. ^ Macrea, Dimitrie; Petrovici, Emil (coord.) (1955–1957), Dicționarul limbii romîne literare contemporane, 4 vols., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 4, 520