Re: Continuity & Cosmetic Operation

----- Original Message -----
From: tolgs001
Sent: Thursday, April 03, 2003
Subject: [tied] Re: Continuity & Cosmetic Operation

>There is still a huge difference between rumîn/român.
>The first one is still the name under which the serf's
>were known in Tara Romaneasca/Valahia/Muntenia in
>medieval times. Is the same thing as using "nigger"
>for "afro-americans".

Not quite, Sorine. "rumân" [ru-'mIn] really has
been the ethnonym, for which "român" is only one
modern variant. ("Mai, Rumâne!" is still in use in
regional and/or colloquial usage.)

I did not hear this form in my >40 years living among the Romanians and for
certain is not used in the literarily language. So, just forget what your
"scholar" books has to say about this because is more than obsolete.

Actually, the
traditional spelling, in the Romanian cyrillic
alphabet, was "rumăn" [ru-'m&n], up to 1860;
possibly, the pronunciation was accordingly; e.g.
Tzara Rumănească. (Note that the Istrian-Romanians
have called themselves "rumări" [ru-'m&rj]) in
their dialect. (The ethnonym used by the other
major group, the Aromanians, isn't useful here,
since, in their dialect, they drop the vowel after
the "r" altogether: "Ar'mân/-i".)

"Serf" was only a *secondary* meaning -

According to Cioranescu's Etymological Dictionary [ed. 1950]:
Romîn/Român:
1. locuitor al României; valah
2. Persoana, crestin
3. taran
4. [invechit] iobag, vecin - varianta invechita si populara rumîn
and here the vecin/vecinie is the obsolete form for serf in Moldova.
Today the only real meaning of this word is inhabitant of România. All the
rest are obsolete. But in the historical writings you still can find the
"serf" meaning.
Român started to be use as far back as end of the XVI century [the same
Cioranescu].

only in the provinces of Oltenia (a.k.a. Little Wallachia
& Wallachia proper (that formed the principality
Tzara Romaneasca or Ungrovlahia)

Yes, what I said as Tara Romaneasca/Valahia/Muntenia

and only for a certain period of time.

Sure, until the serfs existed here! :-)
BUT is the only form/meaning -of a serf from Muntenia- that TODAY still
exists in the Romanian language beside inhabitant of România. All the rest
of the meanings were "lost" during the time.

Besides: "Rumania/n" and "Roumania/n" are old-
fashioned or outdated spellings in English, but
they aren't wrong.

>S o r i n

George

NB: Rome's actual name was... Ruma (an Etruscan toponym).

My point was that today the official name of the country is România and the
citizens are named români. So, it would be nice to refer to them
accordingly. Using the obsolete rumîn, the connoisseurs could think that you
are speaking about the serf's from romanian medieval period and might think
that this is used with a derogatory meaning/intention. End of story.

S o r i n
going back to Banat_ban