Etymologically
Log in

singur

This is the current revision of this entry, as edited by bogdan on 26 October 2026 at 23:35. This address is a permanent link to this version.
Changes in this edit History

Forms

singur (plural singuri, feminine equivalent singurã, feminine plural singuri or singure)[1]

  • Feminine singurã, masculine plural singuri, feminine plural singuri or singure.[1][2]
  • Other spellings: singuru and shungru in Wiktionary;[1] SÍNGUR, feminine -ră, in Papahagi's dictionary, which refers to șúngru;[3] singúru, feminine -ă, in Mihăileanu's Romanian-based spelling;[4] singur in Dalametra's;[5] σίνγκουρου (sínguru) in Nikolaidis's Greek script;[6] in Kavalliotis's word list its editor reads singurw.[7]
  • Regional forms: s'ingur, feminine s'ingurā, for an only child in the village of Turia;[8] singur in the Ohrid–Struga area.[9]

Etymology

It is inherited from Latin singulus (“single, one by one; alone”),[10][3][1] as Nikolaidis also has it.[6] For the r in place of Latin l Pascu compares singulāris.[10] The Latin word is mostly used in the plural, singulī (“one apiece, single”).[11][12] De Vaan reconstructs Proto-Italic *sem-g-lo- and Proto-Indo-European *s(e)m-gʰ- (“single”), from the root of "one" with a distributive particle, later extended with the suffix *-lo-.[12]

The word is shared with Romanian singur and Megleno-Romanian singur.[13][14] Elsewhere in Romance it survives in Vegliote sanglo (“alone”), Old French sangle and Spanish sendos.[15][13]

Earliest recorded meaning

Kavalliotis's word list of 1770 has it for Greek μοναχός (monachós, “alone”), which his editor glosses allein.[7]

Semantic evolution

Aromanian kept the Latin sense of one alone: the adjective means alone, without anyone else, and only, just one.[16][3] With a short personal pronoun it means "oneself": singur-nj "I myself", singur-si "he himself".[3][5][17] Of a child it means an only son or daughter, as in Dalametra's ficior singur and in Turia.[5][8]

Timeline

  • 1770 – singurw (in Meyer's reading) “alone” in Kavalliotis's word list.[7]
  • 1901 – singúru “alone” in Mihăileanu's dictionary.[4]
  • 1906 – singur “alone, only” in Dalametra's dictionary.[5]
  • 1925 – Pascu derives it from Latin singulus.[10]

Meanings

Adjective

  1. alone, by oneself, with no one else.[16][3][1]
  2. Only, sole, just one; of a child, an only child.[16][17][8]
  3. (with a personal pronoun) Oneself, himself.[3][17]

Word family

  • singurami
  • singureatsã
  • singurãtati
  • singurush
  • Romanian singur

References

  1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ Cunia, Tiberius (2008), Dictsiunar a limbãljei armãneascã, Editsii Timpurarã (after T. Papahagi, Ș. Mihăileanu and I. Dalametra; online at dixionline.net), p. 949
  3. ^ a b c d e f Papahagi, Tache (1974), Dicționarul dialectului aromân, general și etimologic, 2nd augmented ed., București: Editura Academiei Republicii Socialiste România, p. 1088
  4. ^ a b Mihăileanu, Ștefan (1901), Dicționar macedo-român, București, p. 467
  5. ^ a b c d Dalametra, I. (1906), Dicționar macedo-român, București: Academia Română, p. 190
  6. ^ a b Νικολαΐδης, Κωνσταντίνος (1909), Ετυμολογικόν λεξικόν της κουτσοβλαχικής γλώσσης, Αθήνα, p. 476
  7. ^ a b c Meyer, Gustav (1895), Albanesische Studien IV: Das griechisch-südrumänisch-albanesische Wörterverzeichnis des Kavalliotis, Sitzungsberichte der Kaiserlichen Akademie der Wissenschaften in Wien, phil.-hist. Classe 132, p. 85
  8. ^ a b c Бара, Мариана; Каль, Теде; Соболев, Андрей Н. (2005), Южноарумынский говор села Турия (Малый диалектологический атлас балканских языков, серия монографий 1), p. 351
  9. ^ Марковиќ, Марјан (2007), Ароманскиот и македонскиот говор од охридско-струшкиот регион (во балкански контекст), Скопје, p. 74
  10. ^ a b c Pascu, Giorge (1925), Dictionnaire étymologique macédoroumain, 2 vols. (I: Les éléments latins et romans; II: Les éléments grecs, turcs, slaves, albanais, germaniques, magyars, néologismes, créations immédiates, obscurs), Iași: Cultura Națională, p. 1, 156
  11. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  12. ^ a b de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
  13. ^ 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)
  14. ^ Capidan, Theodor (1935), Meglenoromânii III: Dicționar meglenoromân, București: Academia Română
  15. ^ Meyer-Lübke, Wilhelm (1935), Romanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., Heidelberg: Winter
  16. ^ a b c Cunia, Tiberius (2008), Dictsiunar a limbãljei armãneascã, Editsii Timpurarã (after T. Papahagi, Ș. Mihăileanu and I. Dalametra; online at dixionline.net)
  17. ^ a b c Papahagi, Pericle (1905), Basme aromâne și glosar, București: Academia Română, p. 696