Romance Copula - Romanian

Romanian

A fi, fire is the copula in Romanian. These infinitive forms evolved from the verb, "to make":

→ fiere → fire → *fir → fi

was the passive infinitive of, and so meant "to be made". In the Vulgar Latin dialects spoken in modern day Romania, its evolved form fiere replaced essere, maybe due to the similarity between the stems fi- of and fu- of . Other forms of the verb a fi are derived from : sunt, ești, e(ste), suntem, sunteți, sunt in the present tense and eram, erai, era, eram, erați, erau in the imperfect.

A sta ( → sta) means "to stay" or even "to stand", "to stand still" or "to dwell/reside" e.g. a sta in picioare, as in Italian stare in piedi or unde stai? – "where do you live/reside?"

A fi