ucide

Forms

ucide (third-person singular present ucide, past participle ucis, third-person subjunctive ucidă), third conjugation^[1] Beside ucid the present is also ucig, after verbs such as încinge, încins, which share the participle in -s.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin occīdō (“to kill”).^{[2][3][4][5][1]} The Latin verb is a compound of ob- and caedō (“to cut, kill”).^[1]

The verb survives in all four branches, but south of the Danube it means “to hit”: Aromanian tsid and Megleno-Romanian uțid “to hit, wound”, while Istro-Romanian učide means “to kill”.^[2][6][7] Its Romance cognates include Italian uccidere, Occitan aucire and Old French ocire.^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

MDA2's first record is the Psaltirea Hurmuzaki, copied about 1500–1520.^[3] It translates Psalm 138:19: „Se ai ucide greaşnicii, Doamne” “if thou wouldst slay the sinners, O God”.^[4] The sense was “to kill”.^[3][4]

Semantic evolution

Tiktin notes that ucide means to kill, even unintentionally, while omorî means to kill deliberately.^[8] In the old language and in Moldavia, Banat, Crișana and Transylvania it also meant “to hit, beat”: the Apostle of 1646 has „Cu pietri-l ucidea” “they pelted him with stones”.^[5][8] Ciorănescu notes that, according to the linguistic atlas, the verb is now rare in Muntenia and Moldavia, and that the sense “to hit” is obsolete.^[2] Folk speech names the devil with curses built on the verb, such as ucigă-l crucea “may the cross kill him”.^[2][3]

Timeline

• c. 1500–1520 – ucide in the Psaltirea Hurmuzaki, the first record.^[3][4]
• 1570 – ucideți “you kill” in Coresi's psalter.^[9]
• 1574 – „Irod ... ucise toţi coconii” “Herod slew all the children” in the Tetraevanghel.^[4]
• 1646 – ucidea “they hit” in the Apostle.^[5]
• 1688 – va ucide “shall kill” in the Bucharest Bible.^[8]

Meanings

Verb

1. to kill, to cause the death of a living being; to murder;^[10][3][1] (reflexive, rare) to kill oneself: Vânătorul a ucis un mistreț.^[10][3][1]
2. (figurative) to destroy, crush.^[10]
3. (regional) to beat or hit hard; to shatter.^[10][5]

Word family

• ucigaș
• ucigan
• ucigător
• sinucide
• pruncucidere

Related words

• sinucidere
• ucidere
• omorî
• Latin occīdō

Usage notes

Ucigă-l crucea and similar curses (ucigă-l toaca, ucigă-l tămâia) are popular names for the devil.^[3][2]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g 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. ucide
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i Academia Română, Institutul de Lingvistică „Iorgu Iordan – Al. Rosetti” (2010), Micul dicționar academic, 2nd ed., 4 vols., București: Univers Enciclopedic Gold, p. 2, 1356
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. ucide
5. ^ a b c d Costinescu, Mariana; Georgescu, Magdalena; Zgraon, Florentina (1987), Dicționarul limbii române literare vechi (1640–1780): termeni regionali, București: Editura Științifică și Enciclopedică, p. 306
6. ^ Capidan, Theodor (1935), Meglenoromânii III: Dicționar meglenoromân, București: Academia Română, p. 321
7. ^ Kovačec, August (1998), Istrorumunjsko-hrvatski rječnik (s gramatikom i tekstovima), Pula
8. ^ 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. ucíde
9. ^ Gînsac, Ana-Maria; Ungureanu, Mădălina; Moruz, Alexandru et al., roPsalt: Re-evaluating the Sixteenth Century Romanian Psalters (aligned corpus), Iași: Universitatea „Alexandru Ioan Cuza”, https://scriptadacoromanica.ro, p. Ps 61:3
10. ^ a b c d DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 1166