The Latin Neuter Plurals in Romance - Page ON

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Cat. dial. poua ‘well of ice’ (the SEFr. puise, Occ. pouso ‘well-bucket’ are
deverbals). The unattested *MURA ‘walls’ appears in Mac.-Rum. mură (with -ă
for -e after r) and It. collective mura, dial. mure, as opposed to individual muri;
here Friulian has muris as the plural of mur, seemingly representing *MURAS,
as -is is the outcome of -AS (cf. brazzis, zenolis, lavris, timplis above), and
there is also an Occ. muro ‘walls in ruins’ and OSard. mura ‘walls’. Equally
there seems to have been a form *POPULA ‘peoples’ to have given Rum. pl.
popoare ‘ditto’, though the fem. sings. OFr. peuple, peuble, Béarn. Poublo, Cat.
Pobla, Sp. Puebla, Ptg. Povoa, all indicating settlements, are reckoned to be
deverbals. From the late CIRCA and CIRCULA ‘circles’ we get Rum. cercuri (sing.
cerc) ‘circles’, ‘hoops’, It. cerchia, originally a plural (“dua cercla bona”,
Rohlfs, §248 n.) but now a singular meaning ‘circle (of walls)’ (cerca seems
only to be found as a deverbal), the OFr. fem. sing. cercle ‘circle’ (cerche is a
deverbal), Occ. cieuclo for a kind of goldfish with double-crescent markings
(cerco is a deverbal, as is Cat. cerca), Sp. cerca ‘encircling wall’, ‘enclosure’,
cercha ‘circular rule’ (given by Menéndez Pidal as < CIRCULA, but the DCELC
says it is taken from French), Ptg. cerca (as Spanish). FOCI ‘fires’ followed the
pattern of LOCA and IOCA, giving Rum. focuri (Istro-Rum. focură), OIt.
f(u)ocora, SIt. fuocore. FURNl/FORNI ‘ovens’ also developed a neuter form,
found in Isidore, and appears in Old Tuscan as fornora, in Neapolitan as forna,
and in the south as fornuri, furnure; there are also the sings. OFr. fourne
(hapax) ‘baking’, Occ. fourno ‘baker’s peel’ and Ast. forna ‘oven’. Late
CULTELLA ‘knives’ has given the OIt. pl. coltella (Rumanian has cuŃite, from a
p.p. meaning ‘honed’), and the sings. V. Antrona curtela, Surs. cuntiala ‘blade’,
Fr. coutelle ‘sculptor’s chisel’, Prov. coutela, OCat. coltella, Sp. cuchilla, Ptg.
cutela ‘large knife’. In the case of MARTELLI ‘hammers’, OIt. pls. martella and
martielgle (Old Umbrian) are matched by Cat. dial. martella ‘sledge hammer’;
Latian cappelləra ‘hats’ for late Latin CAPPELLI ‘headwear’ is probably a recent
formation. For PALI ‘stakes’ there is a SIt. palure, and the Schönkron dictionary
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