Essays

The phonetic or the etymological principle in Romanian orthography?

Camelia Firică ; Spiru Haret University, Craiova Romania

Abstract

In their pursuit to create the Romanian literary language and bring
Romanian orthography closer to that of Latin, genuine philologists and noted connoisseurs of the history of the Romanian language, representatives of the cultural movement known under the name of Şcoala Ardeleană (The Transylvanian School), tried to elaborate a system of spelling based on the etymological principle. The use of the Latin alphabet in writing was regarded as an imperious necessity to support the idea of the Latin origin of the Romanian language and of the Roman origin of the Romanian people – ideas which animated the scholars of the Transylvanian School. The Cyrillic alphabet had
been in use for four hundred years. Not only did this make Romanian spelling difficult, but it also inadequately represented many of the sounds of the Romanian phonemic system and the Latin structure of the language. The efforts of the Transylvanian representatives of the Enlightenment met the approval of all men of letters; nevertheless, as the etymological principle in writing would have required good knowledge of Latin, the phonetic principle prevailed after a series
of debates that lasted more than two centuries. After 1989, when the political regime changed in Romania, the Romanian Academy decided to revert the Romanian spelling regarding the use of /î/â /ɨ / and the present tense forms of the verb ‘to be’ to some former rules, cause
of further debates which, in some respects, still continue. This paper reviews the development of the Romanian system of writing and the pros and cons of the latest changes in spelling.

Keywords

pronunciation; phonetic principle; etymological principle; the Romanian language

Hrčak ID:

165892

URI

https://hrcak.srce.hr/165892

Publication date:

1.3.2009.

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