>the "wise guys" suppose the word was loaned not directly
>from Hungarian but via Bulgarian or an another Slavic dialec.
>For the Hungarian "on" becoming an "â" in Rom. there is no
>other example as this "gond".
Then how about Hung. <bolond> ['bolond] "crazy"> Rum. <bolând>
[bo'lInd] "crazy"? And how about this one, which is much
stronger than that? Hung. bot "stick, club", Rum. bâtã
(meaning the same), and which in Western Romanian subdialectal
pockets is still "botã", not yet "bâtã". (Put them all in
contrast with Rum. bãtz, that has almost all connotations
of these, but perhaps a different etymology.)
To sum up: gond-gând, bolond-bolând, bot-bâtã - the latter
two even having Romanian intermediaries pretty much in use
in many western counties with [u] and [o]: bolund, botã.
This suggest a NW->SE movement.
>For romanian /ã/ & /â/ becoming /o/ in Hungarian there are
>several examples.
You certainly intended to put it vice versa: [o] > [ã] > [â].
>The absence in aromanian is weakening the hypothesis
>this is an inherited word in Rom.
Heureka! :)
>but the presence in Albanian would confirm the
>word is inherited.
But if in Albanian it's the mere (primeval?) meaning
"to grab," then I'd assume that, both in Romanian and in
Hungarian, this word is a loanie, since it only has the
extended, figurative meaning - namely the "comprehendere,"
but not the simple "prehendere" (or - to put it in
Romanian - only "cuprinde," but not "prinde" as well.)
>Honestly, I should like to see if the word
>appear in "Codicele de la Ieud" considered now
>to have been written in 1391.
Ieud having been in Hungary at that time, there's
a *theoretical* possibility for <gând> to have been
included, while in outside territories *not yet.*
>Since you speak Hungarian and Rom. can you remember
>of Hungarian words which have an /o/ within the word
>and it is rendered as /a/ in Rom.?
I'm skeptical there is something like that.
>If yes we can assume that the Hungarian /o/ was felt
>as /a/ by Rom. speakers and /a/>/ã/>/â/ before /n/
>in a regular way.
I'd rather think of [o]<->[u]<->[I]. In Hungarian
itself, dialectally, there has been [o]<->[u] and
[ö]<->[ü], which has influenced Romanians esp. in
Transylvania in loanwords. (Note my tenses: I use
here the Present Perfect on purpose, meaning the
phenomenon is valid today: in some local Hungarian
areas of Transylvania peasants would say <lú>
[lu:], while the rest & standard Hung.-speakers
will say <ló> [lo:] "horse". The o<>u phenomenon
is, IMHO, reflected even in Rum. Cluj - Hung.
Kolozsvár ['koloZva:r] (Ger. Klausenburg), a former
capital of Transylvania. And in Hung. Korond, Rum.
Corund - the name of a town famous for pottery.
But note the name of a Romanian country music
singer (she was popular in the 50s-60s, "M'am
suit in dealu Clujului") Ana Pop-Corondan: although
Corund in Romanian, the name is closer to the
Hung. form. So, the o-u-o-u variations tend to be
a solution for several puzzling situations, I sup-
pose. :-)
>Alex
George