unchi

Forms

unchi m (plural unchi)^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin avunculus (“maternal uncle”), probably through a shortened *unclus.^[2][1][3][4] The Latin word is a diminutive of avus (“grandfather”).^[5][6] The same short form underlies French oncle and Occitan oncle, and the Albanian word is ungj.^[2][7]

Earliest recorded meaning

Tiktin dates the first record to 1581, in the Pravila of Lucaci, a legal code;^[7][3] MDA2 also takes its first record from this text.^[7][3] There it already means a father's or mother's brother: „Fata unchiu-mieu... mi-e vară primare” “my uncle's daughter is my first cousin”.^[8] The DLR has a form unchiu from 1595 and quotations in family deeds of about 1600.^[8]

Semantic evolution

The Latin word meant only the mother's brother; the Romanian word covers the brother of either parent, an aunt's husband and a parent's cousin.^[5][8][4] Unchi mare is a grandparent's brother and unchi mic a cousin of a parent.^[2][7] It also became a familiar way to address an old man, already in Dosoftei's lives of the saints.^[7][4] Tiktin notes that Moldavia used moș in the kinship sense.^[7] All six 17th-century Slavonic–Romanian lexicons have the form unchiu.^[9]

Timeline

• 1581 – unchi in the Pravila of Lucaci, the first record.^[7]
• 1595 – the form unchiu in a document.^[8]
• 1649 – unchiu in Mardarie's Slavonic–Romanian lexicon.^[9]
• 1650 – unchi-său “his uncle” in a text printed in Gaster's chrestomathy.^[8]

Meanings

Noun

1. uncle: the brother of one's father or mother, the husband of an aunt, or a cousin of a parent; also the word nephews and nieces use to address him.^[4][1][3]
2. A respectful way for a younger person to address an elderly man.^[4][7]

Word family

• unchiaș

Related words

• Latin avunculus

Usage notes

The vocative is unchiule, in older and regional use unche; with a possessive the word joins it: unchiu-meu, unchi-său.^[7][3]

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ 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. unchi
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, 1371
4. ^ a b c d e DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 1170
5. ^ a b Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
6. ^ Scriban, August (1939), Dicționaru limbii românești (etimologii, înțelesuri, exemple, citațiuni, arhaizme, neologizme, provincializme), Iași: Presa Bună, p. 1377
7. ^ a b c d e f g h i Tiktin, Hariton (2000–2005), Rumänisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., revised by Paul Miron and Elsa Lüder, 3 vols., Cluj-Napoca: Clusium, p. s.v. unchi
8. ^ 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. unchi
9. ^ a b Ungureanu, Mădălina; Gînsac, Ana-Maria; Moruz, Alexandru (eds.), eRomLex: The First Romanian Bilingual Dictionaries (17th century), Iași: Universitatea „Alexandru Ioan Cuza”, https://scriptadacoromanica.ro, p. s.v. unchiu