unealtă

Forms

unealtă f (plural unelte)^[1] The old plural was also unealte.^[2][3] A document of 1623 has the variant unente: „o cupă de argintu … și alte unente” “a silver cup … and other belongings”.^[4]

Etymology

It is a compound from Romanian un + alt: the plural phrase ⟨une alte⟩ “some [and] other things, all sorts of things”, the feminine plurals of the pronoun unul and of the adjective, from which a singular was then made.^{[3][4][5][2][1]} Old texts still write the plural as separate words, ⟨une alte⟩, beside ⟨unealte⟩.^[3] Ciorănescu accepts the explanation with some caution (“it seems to be”), naming Hasdeu, Philippide, Iordan, Tiktin and the REW as its supporters.^[6] The REW lists ⟨une alte⟩ under Latin alter.^[7] Scriban and Șăineanu give the same origin.^[8][9] Wiktionary compares the English phrase odds and ends.^[1]

Cihac proposed two other origins.^[10][11] In 1870 he took it from Latin ūtēnsilia (“utensils”), with the consonants rearranged, and compared Italian utensili, Spanish utensilio and French ustensile.^[10] In 1879 he withdrew this as forced and proposed a Slavic type like Polish czynidło (“instrument”), related to Old Church Slavonic чинити (činiti, “to arrange”); in the same article he mocked Hasdeu's ⟨une-alte⟩.^[11] Neither view is followed by the later dictionaries.^[6][4]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is in the Palia de la Orăștie of 1581–1582, in the plural, meaning “movable goods, belongings”: Genesis 31:37 reads „ce ai aflat din unealtele caseei tale” “what you have found of all the goods of your house”.^[3][4] A document of 1593 uses it the same way, of a man travelling „cu toate uneltele lui” “with all his belongings”.^[4]

Semantic evolution

The old meaning was a person's movable property, especially objects of value; the Bible of 1688 uses unealtele for Ancient Greek τὰ ὑπάρχοντα (tà hupárkhonta, “possessions”).^[3][4] It also covered the vessels used at table or in the kitchen, and pieces of clothing.^[2] The Slavonic–Romanian lexicons of the 17th century already gloss it with a Slavonic word for “tool”.^[12] The sense “tool, instrument” became the main one: Klein's dictionary of 1801 gives Latin instrumentum, and the Buda Lexicon of 1825 instrumentum, utensile.^[13][14] Writers used it for weapons too.^[15]

The figurative sense, a person or means used by someone for a purpose, usually a bad one, is quoted by Tiktin: „am fost unealta oarbă a răzbunării lui” “I was the blind tool of his revenge”.^[3][5] The verb unelti was formed from it, at first “to work with tools”, now “to plot”.^[2][5] In underworld slang it means a knife or a tool used in a crime.^[16]

Timeline

• 1581–1582 – unealtele “belongings” in the Palia de la Orăștie, the first record.^[3][4]
• 1593 – uneltele “belongings” in a document.^[4]
• 1623 – the variant unente in a document.^[4]
• c. 1660 – in the first 17th-century Slavonic–Romanian lexicon, beside a Slavonic word for “tool”.^[12]
• 1688 – unealtele “possessions” in the Bucharest Bible.^[3]
• 1712 – the derived verb unelti.^[2]
• 1801 – “instrument” in Klein's dictionary.^[13]
• 1888 – the rare unealtă “plotting”, a back-formation from unelti, in Reteganul's tales.^[4][2]

Meanings

Noun

1. A tool or implement, worked by hand or by a machine, used for a technical operation such as shaping or assembling.^[5][2]
2. (figurative) A means used to reach an aim, usually a bad one; a person or group used by someone for such an aim: a ajuns unealta celor puternici “he became the tool of the powerful”.^[5]
3. In unealtă gramaticală, a grammatical function word.^[5]
4. (obsolete, in the plural) Movable goods, belongings.^[2][4]

Word family

• unelti

Related words

• unul
• alt
• sculă

Usage notes

The DLR has a second, rare unealtă “plotting”, a back-formation from the verb unelti, recorded in Reteganul's tales of 1888.^[4][2]

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ 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, 1374
3. ^ 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. unealtă
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Academia Română (1965–2010), Dicționarul limbii române (DLR), serie nouă, tom I–XIX, București: Editura Academiei Române, p. s.v. unealtă
5. ^ a b c d e f DEX (2009), Dicționarul explicativ al limbii române [Explanatory dictionary of the Romanian language], Bucharest: Editura Univers Enciclopedic, p. 1171
6. ^ a b 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. un
7. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter, p. 382
8. ^ Scriban, August (1939), Dicționaru limbii românești (etimologii, înțelesuri, exemple, citațiuni, arhaizme, neologizme, provincializme), Iași: Presa Bună, p. 1378
9. ^ Șăineanu, Lazăr (1929), Dicționar universal al limbei române, 6th ed., Craiova: Scrisul Românesc, p. 678
10. ^ a b Cihac, A. de (1870), Dictionnaire d'étymologie daco-romane I: Éléments latins comparés avec les autres langues romanes, Frankfurt am Main, p. 299
11. ^ a b Cihac, A. de (1879), Dictionnaire d'étymologie daco-romane II: Éléments slaves, magyars, turcs, grecs-moderne et albanais, Frankfurt am Main, p. 439
12. ^ 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. unealtă
13. ^ a b 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. 464
14. ^ 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. 733
15. ^ Macrea, Dimitrie; Petrovici, Emil (coord.) (1955–1957), Dicționarul limbii romîne literare contemporane, 4 vols., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Populare Romîne, p. 4, 580
16. ^ Volceanov, George (2007), Dicționar de argou al limbii române, București: Niculescu, p. s.v. unealtă