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puțin. In DICTIOUS you will not only get to know all the dictionary meanings for the word
puțin, but we will also tell you about its etymology, its characteristics and you will know how to say
puțin in singular and plural. Everything you need to know about the word
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Romanian
Etymology
Uncertain, as with a number of similar words across the Romance languages. Probably from Vulgar Latin *putīnus, a blend/alteration of Latin pisinnus, pittinnus and putillus, pusillus, all meaning “a teeny boy”. Compare Aromanian putsãn; further Albanian picërr, Italian piccino and piccolo, French petit and pitchoun (from Nissart Occitan), Old Logudorese pithinnu, Tarantino piččinnu.
An alternative, perhaps less likely, theory derives it from a Vulgar Latin root *paucīnus, from Latin paucus (“few, little”). Cf. Italian pochino (“a small amount”).
Pronunciation
Adjective
puțin m or n (feminine singular puțină, masculine plural puțini, feminine and neuter plural puține)
(determiner)
- a little, few, little
- some
- small (in quantity), little, reduced, meager
Declension
Adverb
puțin
- a little, few, a small amount
- Antonym: mult
Amicii mei înțeleg numai puțin românește.- My friends understand only a little Romanian.
Synonyms
Derived terms
References
- ^ Przemysław Dębowiak, “Contribution à l’étymologie des adjectifs romans signifiant ‘petit’,” in Essays in the History of Languages and Linguistics: Dedicated to Marek Stachowski on the Occasion of His 60th Birthday, eds. Michał Németh, Barbara Podolak, & Mateusz Urban (Krakow: Księgarnia Akademicka, 2017), 175–90.
- ^ http://www.dex.ro/pu%C8%9Bin