Re: [tied] Try

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, Piotr Gasiorowski <gpiotr@...> wrote:

>
> The late Catalan Chicago etymologist Joan Coromines found `triar' in
> 13th-century Catalan and considered the word problematic. He put

forward

> the hypothesis that it might come from vulgar Latin *destriare, a
> presumably farming term meaning to `to keep grooves separate', from
> Latin stria (= groove --and also crack, cleft, line) and that the
> initial des- might have been misanalyzed as a prefix. Whence the

`triar'

> we find in Catalan and Provençal (also French trier) at about the same
> time, with the common meaning of `(to) distinguish / separate [or

rather

> `keep separate'] / select'. <>
>
> The idea might be true, considering that `triar' is very much alive in
> present-day Catalan as a perfect synonym for `elegir', `seleccionar' or
> `escollir', in all contexts.
> All the same, the postverbal `tria' is interchangeably used (with an
> emphasis on the distinguishing operation being done accurately) for
> `selecció' and, in book contexts, `antologia'. <>
>
> That Coromines's idea might be true is reinforced by the existence and
> common everyday use of `destriar' (corresponding to Coromines's
> hypothesised vulgar Latin word) in today's Catalan, where it means

`(to)

> find or make precise, careful distinctions', the implication being that
> there are two things/concepts that are hard to distinguish or separate
> and the `(des)triar' operation, always requiring some
> attentional/intellectual effort, takes them apart for separate
> manipulation/consideration. <>
>
> In restricted contexts (e.g. farming) `triar' also means `(to) separate
> grain from chaff' (as in threshing) or, more generally, `(to) sift'.
> What is clearly lacking in Catalan (ans also in Provençal) is the

`test'

> or `judge' sense it acquired in Anglo-Norman `trier' and, subsequently,
> in English `try'. (This latter development parallels the shift of Greek
> krinein ---and also Latin (dis)cernere--- from meaning `(to) separate,
> distinguish, ponder carefully about' to meaning, more formally, `(to)
> judge'.) <>
>
> Coromines's hypothesis seems to make sense both in semantic and
> phonological terms. It reconciles the basic senses of the word and
> avoids phonetical difficulties as a Latin tritare morphing implausibly,
> in all three languages, into `triar'.
>
> Ton Sales

********
Interesting, but I'd like to know more about the supposed "vulgar
Latin *destriare, a presumably farming term meaning to `to keep
grooves separate'". The only grooves that I can think of in this
context are furrows. Is there any evidence they were ever called
'striae'?
Varro's "qua aratrum vomere striam facit, sulcus vocatur" (Varr. R.
R. 1, 29, 3) reflects the obvious fact that furrows are groovelike,
but seems to imply they were NOT called 'striae' in classical Latin at
least.
Dan