Talk:List of Romania county name etymologies

Caraş

Couldn't Caraş be from the Turkish word for dark? The river Karašica a bit more west is named like that... --Joy [shallot] 10:27, 16 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I think you're right. AFAIK, Caraş county was part of a Turkish province. In Moldavia and Wallachia there are no Ottoman Turkish names because Turks/Muslims were not allowed to settle. Bogdan | Talk 10:59, 17 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Sibiu

As far as I know, Sibiu comes form the name of the rivers which flows through it - Cibin, which is named after a fortress (probably of roman origin) - Cibinium (Cibiniensis) See:[1]. The name was kept because the germans kept the name of the river - Zibin. -Orioane 13:37, 14 November 2005 (UTC)

That name is in Medieval Latin, i.e. it was a Latinization of a local non-Latin name. There is no mentioning of a "Cibinensis" or "Cibinium" river or fortress in ancient times. bogdan | ^Talk 13:41, 14 November 2005 (UTC)

Vâlcea

In Romanian, the word means "little valley", out of vale;

That is unlikely because of the accent (Vầlcea) is different from (Vâlceà). bogdan 11:57, 23 November 2005 (UTC)

Satu Mare

According to Aetil, the only origin of "Satu Mare" is the "Szatmár", Hungarian name of the city. Does anyone know what is the etymology of "Szatmár"? Mentatus 10:35, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

1. Is Satu Mare truely Romanian for "Big Village"?
2. http://dict.sztaki.hu/english-hungarian (which I used for Szűcsvár) doesn't give anything for "szar" or "mát". We'd need more details, but this alone tilts me toward thehypotehsis that the Hunagarian comes from the Romanian.
3. Has someone asked Aetil for a citation?

Circeus 14:00, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

Yes, sat means "village" (origin: the Latin word "fossatum") and mare means "big" (possible origin: the Latin words "mas" or "maris"). Maybe Aetil can provide us with the Hungarian etymology of "Szatmár", if there is one. Mentatus 15:18, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

I have to say "Szatmár" could just as well be the Hungarian form of "Satu Mare". Also, f aetil's talk page and his Talk/User talk namespace contributions are any indication, he does not seem very responsive to such notes. I say we revert and see whether he protests.

And wouldn't L. "maior" make a sensible etymology to "mar"? Circeus 16:13, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

The root word is "mare", which, due to phonetic reasons, is unlikely to be derived from "maior". OTOH, the ancient word would have to be *maris to fit the phonetic evolution perfectly. bogdan 17:44, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

Why does the Satu Mare entry in the table say "Romanian/German"? What's German in "Satu Mare"? It's obvious that it means "The Great Village" in Romanian, just as its neighboring city, "Baia Mare" means "The Great Mine". Mirc mirc 18:02, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Szatmár is an old, nowadays extremely rare personal name in Hungarian. Probably of Turkish origin, where sat means sell or trade. [See https://hu.wikipedia.org/wiki/Szatm%C3%A1r_(keresztn%C3%A9v)] In this area there was a castle with this name, mentioned already in 1150 as Zothmar. [2]. I hope this helps Koczy (talk) 23:05, 24 January 2017 (UTC)

Vrancea

If valceais "little valley", is it possible that vrancea would be "little raven"? Circeus 14:04, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

• "Vâlcea" is from Vulgar Latin "vallicella" (little valley). Latin diminutive suffix "-icella" is inherited in Romanian as "-(i)cea". (for example, floare "flower", floricea "little flower").
• "Vrana" is from Slavic "врана" (raven or crow in Bulgarian and Serbian). The word is not found in Romanian. (the word for "raven"is "corb")

As such, as I'm not sure. Mixed Slavo-Romanian toponyms are not very likely. I'd suggest an entirely Slavic origin, something like "Vranić" (son-of-the-raven). bogdan 17:44, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

I think Cezar Cherciu proposed first an old Varancha, land of the crows, meaning thick forests.

http://adevarul.ro/locale/focsani/vrancea-Tara-corbilor-negri-1_50efca1556a0a6567e68dd2f/index.html He claimed it was an old name found in some equally old documents. I think the meaning 'black, dark' should be the center of attention, if that hypothesis is right. See the old 'codru meriu' (dark-thick forest) from Moldova (Alb. mjerë). Sl.врана (Proto-Slavic *vorna) has a cognate in Lithuanian and Letonian varna (crow), but the IE root is *wer- (to cook, boil; to burn): rom.urdă, Alb.urdhë = a type of unsalted cheese; Alb.urë = piece of burning wood used for light or fire; firebrand, torch). The same morfem gave *swerd- (“dirty, dark, black”), from where Lat.sordidus and German schwarz come from, but also thraco-illyrian Vardar (gr.Βαρδάριος, 3rd Century BC), the macedonian river, named also Axios in antiquity. See also a dacian river from Romania, Crișul Negru, where the dutch cartographer Abraham Ortelius places Vardaerorum Caput (headway of the same river) and Vardaei, the name of the river. He had access to a lost book on the history of Dacia and the Balkans. Interestingly enough we have also vrancină (= vârtelniță; Eng.reel, winding frame), probably connected with Lat.vertere. Some linguists connect sl.vrană (=barrel vent) with Vrancea in the ideea that it could mean depression, exactly what this region is after all.

(Sorin5780 (talk) 14:13, 11 March 2018 (UTC))

Năsăud

The name Năsăud can hardly derive from the German name Nussdorf. Which linguistic source gives this explanation? What, in general, is the source of this list? Fransvannes 08:25, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

Mostly the Romanian version of the article, which does a few sources that were not ported over. I'd do it, but I do not knoe enough romanian to apply {{cite web}} to them. Circeus 13:17, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

The Hungarian name is Naszód. First documented as Nazwad in 1334. Since there was another place called Naszvad in the historical Hungary (now Nesvady, Slovakia) it is suspected that this is a personal name. Koczy (talk) 23:10, 24 January 2017 (UTC)

Hungarian or Slavic etymology? Nothing Romanian?

Firstly is to keep in mind that Hungarians was not ALL OVER in Dacia! Nor Slaves. Then is hazardous to make guesses about Romanian place names etymology only because "it sounds like".

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I think it is the Romanian wiki members who find out names coming from Romanian just because it sounds like. Cheers 178.48.177.1 (talk) 13:45, 27 November 2018 (UTC)

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May be it’s time to consider that Romanians neighbors had loan words from Romanians and not vice versa. When Huns and Slavs came, they found towns and fortresses, so Dacians / Romanians had yet almost one millennium of western civilizations.

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Found towns and fortresses?? WTF are you talking about? 178.48.177.1 (talk) 13:45, 27 November 2018 (UTC)

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Bacău Uncertain, possibly Hungarian Possibly named after a local warlord called Bako, "-ău" is a common Romanian ending for place names of Hungarian origin? Are you sure? Buzău Romanian (Dacian). Possibly from buză ("lip"). Why not Hungarian as soon as ends in –ău? Or vice-versa. What about Ceahlău, is that an Hungarian place name? Others Asău, Bârsău, Castău, Catcău, Cergău, Chşcău, Copalău, Cricău, Dumbău … Vaşcău (68 pcs.!) All Hungarians? Just nothing, nothing Romanian? Are you sure about "local warlord called Bako". Bakó means hangman! Just a cognate! I guess you know what cognate is. Ask also, for the saying "şi-a găsit bacăul".

About cognates: We have in Romania "Veneţia De Jos" and "Veneţia De Sus" and for Venice we say Veneţia (!) but is only a cognate. We have Alexandria but it is not that from Egypt. There are Moscows in the USA and in Canada.

Severin severin is NOT an obsolete Slavic word for "Northern"! Nobody knows such thing. That’s your bug. Sever, yes, means North in Slavic but never "severin". But Turnu–Severin is not in the North if you are not looking from Cairo. Severinus (masc.), Severina (fem.) are old Latin names from Severius, Septimius Sever. As a common name "sever" means in Romanian "hard, severe, harsh, strict, rigid, unrelenting". Consider also "Banatul de Severin", "comitatul Severin".

Yes, "severin" is a word Slavic word for "Northern". In Serbian it's "severni" and in Bulgarian, it's "severen". If it were Latin, it would look like "sărân", not as "severin". (intervowel "v" is always lost (cf. lavare -> a la) , vowels before "n" turn to "â" (romanus -> român), unstressed e turns to ă/a). bogdan 17:03, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

Ilfov why Slavic? Because ends in –ov? You mean that Finnish names as Ponteva, Mahtava, French Gustav, Danish Olav are all Russians because the "–v" end? What about Braşov or Snagov? Slavics, eh?

Yes. Both "Braşov" and "Snagov" are also from Slavic. Braşov from "baras", meaning fortress and Snagov from "sneg", meaning snow. bogdan 17:03, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

I was wondering whether it would be possible for "Braşov" to originate from "bârsă" (see also "Ţara Bârsei"). Mentatus 09:07, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

Bârsă is an old Romanian word of Dacian origin -- but I can't see how it could combine with Slavic -ov and result that phonetical form.bogdan 09:38, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

Suceava From Szűcsvár (?!?) Oh, NO, that's a big mistake. All Dacians towns' and fortresses' names are ending in –ava! Sic! You have to consider a lot of cognates. To pronounce the place name Suceava [sutchava] they have to write Szucsava that remember the Hungarian word szűcs. That’s all.

Again, all intervowel "v"s were lost in Romanian between 100 AD and now. Also, no, they were ending in "dava", not "-ava". bogdan

Yeah, but in all pre-modern hungarian town names, considering the hungarian pronunciation of those times, var became "or"/"oara". However by Simion Dascalu (or Axinte Uricariu, i'm not sure who made the first claim, but anyway he said the info was taken from a hungarian chronicle) - in the late 17th century, "v" was pronounced v. So, I think "suczvar" is just folk etymology. Anonimu 17:54, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

Suceava is obviously not of Hungarian origin! First of all, NOT all intervocalic "v" were lost! Example: "Sever" <- Latin "severus". It didn't become "săr". People are forgetting there was another city, in southern Dacia, called "Sucidava", which sounds surprisingly close to "Suceava"! Considering the accent of the people from Moldova, it's even closer. Read loudly the two names with a Moldovan accent! There are only two possible origins for Suceava: from Dacian, "suci" + "dava" (dava being a VERY common termination, meaning fortress) or the Romanian verb "a suci" (to turn, to twist). Especially considering there's a river, Suceava, that, "coincidentally", has lots of turns. Even the article about Suceava says it comes from Dacian, as it's the most plausible explanation! Oh and by the way, loss of intervocalic "D" is not an uncommon transformation either, together with loss of intervocalic "B" (ex: Latin "oblitare" -> "obitare" -> "oitare" -> "uitare"; meaning "to forget"). "Sucidava" -> "Suciava" is a perfectly fine transformation, linguistically. While "ia" -> "ea" is a specific Moldovan accent transformation (any Romanian should know this). Mirc mirc 18:02, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Suceava comes from the river Suceava and -ava is a specific hydronimic forming suffix: Moldava (old for Moldova), Târnava, Bârzava and so on. I'm not sure if this affix wasn't present in some thracian dialects also, not only in balto-slavic. I remember it is also used to form adjectives in Romanian, but I don't understand the nuances it gives. Might be an augmenting suffix, distinct from it's hydronimic role.

We have also that interresting suceve (very tall cliffs). Might be related with thracian *suci: Sucidava, Succci-pass, suci tribe, from PIE *k'[ē]w-, *k'wā- (to swell, to spread out, to be strong, etc). See Alb.sukë (hillock) and Rom.ciucă (hillock; rounded top of a mountain or a hill). Suci tribe (gr. Σοῦκοι or Σύκοι) comes down to the Danube valley from high up in the Balkan mountains where they were taxing some mountain passes. Their counterparts from Oltenia might have occupied a similar geographic niche, hence their name. http://starling.rinet.ru/cgi-bin/response.cgi?single=1&basename=/data/ie/piet&text_number=++1505&root=config

(Sorin5780 (talk) 13:36, 11 March 2018 (UTC))

Vâlcea Romanian/Slavic Yes, "vâlcea" means Romanian for "little valley", from vale, "valley" (Latin vallis). That’s all. But you have another bug: Also possibly from vlk ("wolf"), the name of a Dark Age Slavic warlord mentioned in Hungarian chronicles. Oh! No. In Mahabharata! There are not place for a Dark Age in Vâlcea. Well, Farcaş-ruller is known in Oltenia and it happen so that farkas means in Hungarian "wolf". So what!

Ardeal - "wooden hill" - arde expresses an Indo-European root meaning forest, the same as in English Forest of Arden and Belgian Ardennes Woods; Deal means hill in Romanian. Why Arad Hungarian? Why not Hebrew? Means hand. Named after the city of Arad, formerly Urod (11th century) (of course, their pronunciation for Arad!) after the name of a Hungarian knight, probably from the root ur meaning lord. Why not Urvár? Nonsense, history does not mention such a "Hungarian knight". But they have enough time to invent it.

In old Romanian "frânc", "frâncu[l]" means "occidental", "Frankish". "Frâncu" is an usual surname in Romanian. Etymology "francea"-"vrancea" is most probable, under German influence, (Saxonians) initial "v" is pronounced "f". Legend of "Baba Vrâncioaia" could be "Baba Frâncioaia". 88.192.241.146 20:58, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Other Names

Sălaj: Some hungarian etymologists claim that the name Zilah (and of course the county Szilágy) comes from the Latin "silva", which means forest.

Maramures: Maybe from "mare-mures" (mára-maros)- meaning great Maros --> for the Tisa river (Tisza).

In addition: Many city and county names in Moldova have in fact hungarian origin, because Moldova was a part of the Hungarian Kingdom in the 14th century --> at this time the first cities in Moldova began to develope, and because the rulers (e.g. Nagy Lajos) were hungarians, they got hungarian names (although the population wasn't mainly hungarian) --> their names lasted until today. Öcsi 21:23, 21 October 2006 (UTC)

Bihor

It might be of Sarmatian / Iranian origin. Well attested in indo-iranian languages. Very numerous iranian toponymes are to be found in western Romania, reconoscible after the termination and , specific to Iranian languages (Zarand, Tamand, Zerind, etc). —Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.113.192.216 (talk) 23:06, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

Elaborate on that -and suffix. I do not remember a specific affix like that in ossetian (both dialects, iron and digor) and bessides that, the 'crișana subdialect' (and others) had a specific split of accentuated 'n' and 'm' in 'nd', 'mb': plămân (lung)- plămândă, carâm (leggings) - cărâmb, scrum (ash) - scrumb and so on. It's found in other IE idioms, but the most affected are the albanian dialects.

For Bihor was proposed also a balcanic bigor, bigorr (carstic spring) found in Albanian, Macedonian, Serbian, Aromanian dialect and western Romania (Banat, Apuseni). It was thought to be Albanian in origin, but it is too wide spread to be just Albanian. http://www.dacoromania.inst-puscariu.ro/articole/2004-2005_14.pdf

The change of intervocalic 'g' to 'h' appears in other words: dihanie (monster) - diganie, digoare  (stench)- dihoare/duhoare.

(Sorin5780 (talk) 12:57, 11 March 2018 (UTC))

There is one Bihar in Northern India, at the territory that Iranian Sakas conquered (all the chronicles say Hungarians were of Scythians). Cheers 178.48.177.1 (talk) 13:37, 27 November 2018 (UTC)

Dâmboviţa

Dâmboviţa - Uncertain, possibly Slavic - Named after the Dâmboviţa River, of unknown etymology.

I really don't have citations to support this, but it is quite logical to assume that the first part would be the actual word "dâmb" (Romanian substratum word meaning "hill", "knoll").

As for the second part, "-oviţa", I'm not quite sure, but I think it could possibly be: -ovo/-evo (Slavic suffix indicating a placename, meaning "belonging to") + -iţa (-itsa in Slavic; a suffix indicating the feminine gender, a common practice in Romanian toponymy). So you get: dâmb-ov(o)-iţa.

It's also good to consider that there are also other names, such as "Dâmbovicioara" (a tributary river). -ioara/-ioară being a diminutive suffix (also for the feminine form). This would appear, in my opinion, if there already was an entity such as "Dâmbov" (hypothetical, but not far-fetced; it would mean "belonging to the hill/of the hill"), which you could later manipulate according to your needs. By this I mean that it probably evolved at first from a substratum word with only one Slavic suffix, to which others were added later.

Hirx (talk) 08:00, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

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I don't understand: "Named after the Olt river, known to the Dacians as Alutus (etymology unknown). The initial "o" could indicate a Slavic intermediary."

So the Dacians forget the name of their own river, and they heard it back from the Slavs? Sounds logical, just like all the explanations about Dacian names of Transylvania. :) Actually Dacian language is not known. How can one be so sure that a toponym is Dacian? Whether Dacians were hiding in the forests or not, they were swept away completely because no toponyms left after them. All the names in Transylvania are Slav, Saxon, Turk, Hungarian. Bad news for the Daco-Roman theory believers...:S 178.48.177.1 (talk) 13:42, 27 November 2018 (UTC)

92.16.112.94 (talk) 16:05, 1 August 2019 (UTC) Careful in comparing modern slavic languages with an old extinct language. Your point is unclear: is it about all territories occupied by Dacians or about the Transylvanian region only? The Thraco-Dacian language is to Romanian what the Mansi dialect is to Hungarian; some say even more. Dacian was an old but localised language part of the same sub-family of indo-european languages thracians and slavs in region were speaking, all of which had many common roots and words 2000 years ago. Don't forget 'old' does not mean static either, but is dynamic in time. 200 years meant a lot in linguistic terms when language was mostly oral in Europe rather than written. Modern slavic, say Bulgarian, is vastly different from what it was 2000 years ago, but overall they (indo-european dialects in the Carpathian/Balkan/panonian regions) used to share more similarities. In looking for Dacian words, you might find that the territory that is today under Romania might not coincide with the area occupied by the dacians, thraco-dacians, celto-dacians etc., which today includes parts of Bulgaria, Ukraine, Slovakia, Hungary and others. People living close to the southern Carpathian arc developed different language and cultural identities in time and eventually scrapped the Cyrillic script whereas all surrounding countries kept it. They moreover started identifying themselves more with latins and some celtic tribes; indicating that, indeed, people in that region had slightly different origins and possibly dialects. Regarding your Hungarian remark, the Hungarian conquest happened after the 9th century; and they displaced celts as well as dacians and whoever else was occupying the panonian region and intracarpathian arc; displacement however does not necessarily happen by mass-killing, it isn't a singular event, Hungarian people also assimilated and assimilate other cultures, and you might want to check genetic markers (Haplogroups) to see origin differences more clearly. 'Denial' would mean naming Hungarian people turks, because they stayed under Turkish occupation for a long time after they migrated to the north-east of the black sea. The gradual disappearance of a language, moreover, is not the same as the disappearance of the people speaking it, and it might merely indicate adaptation efforts of communities. Thraco-dacian is currently accepted to account for 1% of the modern Romanian language because of no other more plausible origin suggestions. 30% of the Hungarian language alone is classified as 'uncertain'. It is suggested that the 'slavs' and 'dacians' 2-3000 years ago were quite similar, but they developed separately and under different influences; you can bet life in the Carpathian mountains was different from the plains and more secluded. Even now in 2019 the Romania country has multiple areas different from each other in terms of knowledge, culture, cuisine, legends, archaisms, etc. These regional differences used to be even more pronounced only 100 years ago, linguistically as well. So in that aspect, Romanian people today differ by region in noticeable ways, 2 most obvious being cooking and 'dialect words'. You can bet these differences were even more pronounced between the 'dacians' themselves depending on geographical region; but the same held true for slavic nations. Nevertheless, they came together to fight for a common goal, usually against nomad invaders, as it has been told my numerous historical accounts, including by Greek and Latin 'historians' of those days (which were called 'philosophers').