# giorno, jour vs dia



## killerbee256

I wondering about the internal logic involved in the selection of  _giorno_, _jour_ vs _dia_, _zi _in romance languages. I realize the western Iberian romance was cut off from other romance dialects early in it's evolution so it went in different directions. I also find it odd that Romanian closer to Italian in most way shares the same root as Iberian romance.


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## OBrasilo

But _giorno_ and _jour_ do share the same root too, they are just derived. The latin form was _diurnus_, ie. daily, from _dies_, day. Italian at last archaically also has _dì_ as the doublet for _giorno_, _giorno_ is just preferred. Not sure about French, though.


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## merquiades

Yes, there is only 1 root word for all forms: _dies, diurnus_ being the adjective form_.  Diurno _does exist in Spanish and Portuguese as well.  The French/ Italian _jour(nal)_ / _giorno_ show that the di- was palatalized in its evolution.  Romanian _zi_ also looks like it suffered palatalization.
French and Italian do have _di(es) _surviving in some fixed contexts, for instance attachment to the days of the week:  lundi/ lunedì (día lunes...), mardi/ martedì, mercredi/mercoledì, jeudi/giovedì, vendredi/venerdì, samedi.

This etymology given by the CNRTL gives some interesting information


> substantivation de l'adj. _diurnus _« journalier, quotidien »; de même orig., l'a. prov. _jorn _(xiies. ds Rayn.), l'ital. _giorno, _le cat. _jorn; _du lat. class. _dies _« jour de 24 heures; jour (opposé à la nuit) », l'a. fr. _di _(842, _Serments, _éd. Henry_Chrestomathie, _p. 2, 4), l'a. prov. _dia _(_ca _1060, _Chanson de Sainte Foy_), _di _(début xies. _Boèce, _176 : ms. _dias, _mais la versif. exige _dis_), l'ital. _dia, di, _le cat. esp. port. _dia _(_dia, _à travers un type lat. _*dia_); _cf. _le type _jeudi._


So _diurnus > jour _ converted from adjective to noun.  _Jour_ then came to mean day as contrasting night, and _di(es)_ was the 24 hour day. Reason for it being added to the days of the week for example.


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## killerbee256

I hadn't known about _Diurno_ it seems rather obscure in Spanish & Portuguese. It sort of reminds me of _ave_ vs _uccello_/_oiseau_ both being from _avis_ but _ave_ is from the ablative while _uccello and oiseau _are from the diminutive _avicellus_.


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## Penyafort

killerbee256 said:


> I hadn't known about _Diurno_ it seems rather obscure in Spanish & Portuguese. It sort of reminds me of _ave_ vs _uccello_/_oiseau_ both being from _avis_ but _ave_ is from the ablative while _uccello and oiseau _are from the diminutive _avicellus_.



There clearly was a sort of lexical innovation wave in Later Latin that didn't reach the outlying areas of the Romance world, that is, West Iberia (Portuguese+Spanish) Romania, and Sardinia (and Southern Italy, to a certain point). That is why they keep some 'older' Latin versions for some words, such as the PASSARUS/AVICELLUS one you mention. That is why words like TABLE, CHEESE, SPEAK, BOIL, FEAR, etc., are similar in the central languages (French, Italian, Catalan...) but not in the peripheral ones.


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## killerbee256

I hadn't thought of it that way before, thought it makes sense given the way that Iberia and Dacia/Dalmatia fell out of imperial control first.


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## Nino83

killerbee256 said:


> I hadn't known about _Diurno_ it seems rather obscure in Spanish & Portuguese.



After a quick research, in Portugal it is used in expressions like "período diurno" (for example "da limpeza urbana" or of other working hours), "horário diurno" (à escola, ao trabalho), so "diurno/nocturno" are used, at least in newspapers. 
The evolution is similar to that of initial _yod_, _iocum > gioco, jou_ or that of _d + yod_, _radius > raggio, diurnum > giorno_. 
In Brazilian Portuguese there is _di > ʤ_ so _dia_ [ʤiɐ].


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## fdb

Nino83 said:


> After a quick research, in Portugal it is used in expressions like "período diurno" (for example "da limpeza urbana" or of other working hours), "horário diurno" (à escola, ao trabalho), so "diurno/nocturno" are used, at least in newspapers.



diurno is surely a "cultism".


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## Nino83

fdb said:


> diurno is surely a "cultism".



In Italian too.


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## Cossue

Spanish, Portuguese and Galician also have the words _jornal_ 'daily' (in Spanish 'daily pay-check', in Galician and Portuguese also 'daily news') and _jornada _'distance that can be travelled in one day > day'. In Galician they are both documented since the 13th century, but Coromines says that western Iberian languages probably took this words from Occitan.


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## Nino83

In Italian _giornale_ as adjective (daily) is now obsolete (now it is only a noun and means _newspaper_) and was replaced by _giornaliero_, while _giornata_ is common.


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## Cossue

Nino83 said:


> In Italian _giornale_ as adjective (daily) is now obsolete (now it is only a noun and means _newspaper_) and was replaced by _giornaliero_, while _giornata_ is common.


Oops! Yes, absolutelly. As long as I know _jornal_ is no longer an adjective in western Iberian languages, but a substantive: "daily something"; and at least for Galician, it was already a substantive in the 13th century.

Galician and Portuguese have another word that I think is more _castiza_: _jeira_ "Terreno que uma junta de bois pode lavrar num dia" (Priberam), Galician _xeira_ < *djaira < _diariam. _Again, it is an old adjective turned into substantive.


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## Penyafort

In Catalan, both solutions for day exist (*dia */ *jorn*), but in modern Catalan the latter is only found in poetry.


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## bearded

merquiades said:


> French and Italian do have _di(es) _surviving in some fixed contexts, for instance attachment to the days of the week: lundi/ lunedì (día lunes...), mardi/ martedì, mercredi/mercoledì, jeudi/giovedì, vendredi/venerdì, samedi.


In Italian, we can say _buondì _as a common alternative to _buongiorno. _In other contexts - other than names of weekdays -   _dì _(with stress, in order not to confuse it with preposition _di _= of) is poetic or obsolete. Anyhow, we do say e.g. _quattro volte al dì _(four times a day), especially in medical prescriptions.




Cossue said:


> Galician and Portuguese have another word that I think is more _castiza_: _jeira_ "Terreno que uma junta de bois pode lavrar num dia" (Priberam), Galician _xeira_ < *djaira < _diariam. _Again, it is an old adjective turned into substantive.


In Italian we have a substantive _la diaria_, too, and it means the 'daily pay/wage' (in professions where you are paid day by day).


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## killerbee256

I wonder when these changes took place, at first I thought it was at the transition to romance from late Latin. But given the survival of both forms in many languages, thought one or the other being archic, would seem to suggest the selection of one form or the other happened in the middle ages. When I think about it more _ Diurno, _seems to be a learned or semi learned word, the _j_ forms are obvious loans form Gallo-romance.


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## merquiades

Jour / giorno and all the derivatives are native to French and Italian only. The j-words that appear sporadically in other languages even English (journey) are recent borrowings from French.


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## Penyafort

merquiades said:


> Jour / giorno and all the derivatives are native to French and Italian only. The j-words that appear sporadically in other languages even English (journey) are recent borrowings from French.



In Catalan _jorn _is already attested in Ramon Llull (Raymond Luly) and in the James I's Chronicle, so it was clearly native, even if not used nowadays.


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## killerbee256

Penyafort said:


> In Catalan _jorn _is already attested in Ramon Llull (Raymond Luly) and in the James I's Chronicle, so it was clearly native, even if not used nowadays.


Makes since, given for much of it's development it was part of the same language as Occitan. Before one came under the influence of Castilian and other northern Langues d'oïl.


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## merquiades

I wasn't addressing Catalan in my message, but given the language's Gallo-Romance origins, _jorn_ might be the original word. Catalan started off similar to Occitan but then in its history took a sharp turn towards Ibero-Romance. This explains lots of doublets (_cercar / buscar, restar / quedar, vós / vostè,  semblar / pareixer_,....) in the language. _Dia_ probably got the upperhand long after Llull's time.


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## Penyafort

Yes, I imagine it as having gone a bit like this:

(Classical Latin) DIURNU(M) 
> (Vulgar Latin)  ʤórno
>> (Old Italian) ʤórno
>>> (Italian) *ʤórno*​>> (Old Gallo-Romance) ʤórn
>>> (Old Occitan/Old Catalan) ʤórn
>>>> (Occitan) *ʤórn*
>>>> (Catalan) *ʒórn */ *ʤórn*​>>> (Early Old French) ʒór
   >>>> (Old French) ʒur
>>>>> (French) *ʒuR*​


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## CapnPrep

Just a passing remark:


Penyafort said:


> >>>> (Occitan) *ʤórn*​


The majority Occitan pronunciation is [dʒur] (_o_ has raised to _u_, as in French).​


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## Penyafort

CapnPrep said:


> Just a passing remark:
> The majority Occitan pronunciation is [dʒur] (_o_ has raised to _u_, as in French).​



Indeed. I forgot to add a subline there. Thanks for the remark.


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## Outsider

bearded man said:


> In Italian we have a substantive _la diaria_, too, and it means the 'daily pay/wage' (in professions where you are paid day by day).


In Portuguese too, along with _jorna_ (the latter a bit disused nowadays).


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## Gavril

Penyafort said:


> Yes, I imagine it as having gone a bit like this:
> 
> (Classical Latin) DIURNU(M)
> > (Vulgar Latin)  ʤórno



I wonder how the Welsh word _diwrnod_ "calendar day, 24-hour period" fits into all of this. _diwrnod_ is clearly from Latin _diurnāta_ (> French _journée_, etc.), but was it adopted before the palatalization of [di]/[dj], or was it "depalatalized" on the basis of the Latin spelling, and/or because Welsh (or its immediate forerunner) lacks palatal sounds such as [dʒ]?

Cornish has _jorna_ "day" (where_ j_ = [dʒ] or [ʒ]), but so far I can't find a cognate of _diwrnod_ in Breton, so perhaps this word is a relatively late arrival (rather than having been adopted during Roman rule of Britain, like so many other Latin words in British Celtic).


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## killerbee256

Does welsh generally drop the final vowel like that in Latin loans? I'm far far from an expert but it's morphology looks to me like a late Latin loan, from around the time romans left. I say this because the final vowel is dropped but not yet the "final consonant," I mean the t/d sorry I'm an anthropologist not a linguist I don't know all the terms.


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## Gavril

killerbee256 said:


> Does welsh generally drop the final vowel like that in Latin loans?



Yes, Welsh generally deletes the original final syllables of words, and this deletion seems to have occurred after Welsh had adopted most of its Latin vocabulary (thus in the later- or post-Roman era). For example, _cwyn_ "dinner/supper" is from Latin _cēna_ and _pysgod_ "fish" is from Lat. _piscātus_.


> I say this because the final vowel is dropped but not yet the "final consonant," I mean the t/d sorry I'm an anthropologist not a linguist I don't know all the terms.



The t was the last consonant of the word stem, but it wasn't the final consonant (as the term is normally used) because _diurnāta_ did not end in it.


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## killerbee256

I wonder if the dropping of the final syllable was a feature of British romance dialects? If, perhaps, it was part of the same larger dialect group as Gallo-romance, thus went through some of the same early sound changes.


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