mini

Forms

mini^[1]

• Also written mine, Cunia's second spelling and Wiktionary's alternative form; the short form is mi.^[2][1]
• Other spellings: MÍNE in Papahagi's dictionary;^[3] míne in Mihăileanu's Romanian-based spelling;^[4] μίνε in Nikolaidis's Greek script, which he describes as common in the northern part of the Aromanian area.^[5]
• Regional forms: mine in Weigand's texts from the north and Albania, where it is used instead of iou;^[6] Mine in P. Papahagi's tales.^[7]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin mē (“me”), the accusative of the first-person pronoun, in a longer form whose ending is not clear.^[8][1] Papahagi starts from *mene.^[3] Ciorănescu reports the reconstruction *me ne of Philippide and of Candrea and Densusianu, and Scriban's form, the same as Papahagi's, made after *quene, the source of Romanian cine (“who”); he thinks the ending is the accusative marker also seen in tătîne.^[8] Wiktionary allows both a Vulgar Latin form and an analogy with tsini.^[1] In Latin, mē continues the accusative Proto-Italic *mē and Proto-Indo-European *h₁mé (“me”).^[9]

Daco-Romanian has mine and Megleno-Romanian mini.^[8][10][11]

Earliest recorded meaning

The oldest dated record is Weigand's glossary of 1894, which has mine “I” as the subject form used in the north and in Albania instead of iou.^[6]

Semantic evolution

The Latin accusative serves in Aromanian both as the object form and as the subject form of the pronoun, for men and women alike.^[2][3] As an object it may take the preposition pri, which is usually left out in speech.^[2] Mihăileanu records mine mi va (“he seeks me”),^[4] and P. Papahagi's tales have mași mine mi cunoaște (“he knows only me”).^[7] As a subject it replaces io in the north and in Albania, according to Weigand,^[6] and Nikolaidis calls it common in the northern part.^[5]

Timeline

• 1894 – mine “I” in Weigand's glossary, for the north and Albania.^[6]
• 1901 – míne “I; me” in Mihăileanu's dictionary.^[4]
• 1905 – Mine in the glossary of P. Papahagi's tales.^[7]
• 1909 – μίνε in Nikolaidis's dictionary.^[5]

Meanings

Pronoun

1. (accusative) me, the object form of the first person singular, masculine and feminine.^[2][3][1]
2. (nominative) I, as the subject.^[2][3][6]

Related words

• io
• iou
• mi
• nji
• Romanian mine
• Megleno-Romanian mini

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e Cunia, Tiberius (2008), Dictsiunar a limbãljei armãneascã, Editsii Timpurarã (after T. Papahagi, Ș. Mihăileanu and I. Dalametra; online at dixionline.net), p. 653
3. ^ a b c d e Papahagi, Tache (1974), Dicționarul dialectului aromân, general și etimologic, 2nd augmented ed., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Socialiste România, p. 815
4. ^ a b c Mihăileanu, Ștefan (1901), Dicționar macedo-român, București, p. 302
5. ^ a b c Νικολαΐδης, Κωνσταντίνος (1909), Ετυμολογικόν λεξικόν της κουτσοβλαχικής γλώσσης, Αθήνα, p. 293
6. ^ a b c d e Weigand, Gustav (1894), Die Aromunen: ethnographisch-philologisch-historische Untersuchungen, vol. II: Volksliteratur der Aromunen (with a glossary), Leipzig: J. A. Barth, p. 317
7. ^ a b c Papahagi, Pericle (1905), Basme aromâne și glosar, București: Academia Română, p. 638
8. ^ 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)
9. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
10. ^ Papahagi, Pericle (1902), Megleno-românii: studiu etnografico-filologic I, București: Academia Română (with a glossary), p. 94
11. ^ Candrea, I.-A. (1927–1937), Glosar megleno-romîn I–IV, Grai și suflet III: 175–209; IV: 381–413; VI: 163–193; VII: 194–233, p. 167