până

See also: Appendix:Variations of "pana"

Romanian

Alternative forms

• pînă — superseded
• пынэ (pînă) — post-1930s Cyrillic spelling

Etymology

Inherited from Latin paene ad (“almost to”). Compare Aromanian pãnã.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈpɨ.nə/

• Audio

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɨnə
• Hyphenation: pâ‧nă

Adverb

până

1. Optionally preceding și (“even”, adverb) for emphasis or clarification.

Conjunction

până

1. (temporal) until, till, up to

Usage notes

The conjunction până may connect to the next sentence alone or succeeded by când or ce; use with când is appropriate for any register, use without any other conjunction fits any register other than formal written language, and use with ce is uncommon and appropriate for the informal or literary register.

Preposition

până

1. (spatial or temporal) until, till, up to
2. (by extension, informal) over to

   Merg până în bucătărie, vrea cineva ceva?

   I’m going over to the kitchen, does anybody want anything?

Usage notes

If governing a noun, până must first be followed by another spatial preposition. The default second preposition to use is la, which is also appropriate for nouns without spatial significance: până la golire (“until emptying”).

If până is used with an adverb (such as mâine (“tomorrow”), târziu (“late”) or jos (“down”)), or with a noun that can be used without a proposition as a temporal adverb, such as iarna (“(in) winter”) or anul trecut (“last year”), no preposition is necessary.

Derived terms

• de unde până unde
• până în gât
• până în pânzele albe
• până la unul
• până la urmă
• până peste cap
• până una alta

References

• până in DEX online—Dicționare ale limbii române (Dictionaries of the Romanian language)