Etymology: < Romania (also Rumania, (now hist.) Roumania), the name of a country in south-eastern Europe (Romanian România , †Rumînia , (now nonstandard) Romînia ; < român , †rumîn , (now nonstandard) romîn , etc., adjective and noun (16th cent.; < classical Latin Rōmānus Roman adj.¹) + -ia , suffix forming nouns) + -an suffix (compare -ian suffix), originally after French †romanien, †roumanien, noun (1810 or earlier denoting an inhabitant or native of Romania, 1888 or earlier denoting the language) and adjective (1869 or earlier; the now usual French word is roumain : see below). Compare German rumänisch , adjective (1857 or earlier), Rumäne , noun ‘inhabitant or native of Romania’ (1848 (as †Roumaine ) or earlier), Rumänisch (noun), denoting the language (1885 or earlier; 1863 or earlier as †Romänisch ); also French roumain , noun (1836 denoting a person, 1871 denoting the language) and adjective (1840 designating a person, 1848 designating the language). Compare later Aromani n., Rouman adj., Rouman n.Until recently Rumanian was the dominant spelling in the 20th cent., but now Romanian is the officially preferred form. The three types of English spellings ultimately reflect similar formal variation in the Romanian names of the country and its inhabitants, which is also reflected in various foreign languages (for instance, post-classical Latin Rumuni (plural noun) is attested in Hungarian sources in the late 18th cent., and German spellings in †Rumun- are found until the second half of the 19th cent.). Both types of Romanian forms, in ru- and in ro- , are attested from the 16th cent., but the form in ru- was predominant until the first half of the 19th cent., when the form in ro- came to be overwhelmingly preferred by intellectuals (from c1840 onwards) on account of its formal proximity to roman Roman adj.¹, which was perceived as emphasizing the Roman heritage of the Romanian people. The forms with -ou- in the first syllable are after French. N.E.D. (1909) enters this under Roumanian and gives only the pronunciation (rumēⁱ·niăn) /ruːˈmeɪnɪən/. Although the Romanian family of place-name and related words has /o/ in the first syllable, the English pronunciation with /oʊ/ as first-syllable vowel is probably a spelling pronunciation.

Etymology: < Romani n. + -an suffix. Compare slightly earlier Romani adj. and later Rom adj.

Etymology: < the name Romanus (c790; see note at definition) + -ian suffix, after German Roman'scher Buchstabe ( A. Schubiger Sängerschule St. Gallens vom achten bis zwölften Jahrhundert (1858) 11; usually in plural Roman'sche Buchstaben).