A CONCISE ° GERMAN ETYMOLOGICAL DICTIONARY eae a 0% M'0°C? WALSHE, M.A. ear in German and Head ofthe Departmen of Germanie Languages {ithe Onority of Noting WITH A SUPPLEMENT : ON THE ETYMOLOGY OF SOME MIDDLE HIGH GERMAN WORDS EXTINCT IN MODERN GERMAN By MARIANNE WINDER, BA. 1951 ROUTLEDGE & KEGAN PAUL LTD Broadway House, 68-74 Carter Lane London LIBRARY UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA DAVISFirst published in 1951 by Routledge and Kegan Paul Limited 68 Carter Lane, London, 2.0. 4 Printed in Great Britain by Stephen Austin d& Sons Limited Hertford Owing 10 production delays this Book was not published until 1952 PREFACE JHE purpose of this dictionary is to fill a long-felt need for I English-speaking students of German, who often have dificalty in understanding the explanations of some of the German works of reference on this subject, or to whom such works are not readily accessible, It makes no attempt to be exhaustive, Dut secks on the other hand to avoid the extreme of compression which withholds essential links in the obain of reasoning, so that ‘he student is enabled to see how the proffered derivation of a given word is arrived at. Many etymologies are disputed or problematical, and in most such cases the most probable-seeming derivation has * been given with little or no discussion of other possibilities. “But etymology is a subject of study where probabilities have to be ‘weighed against each other, and there is room for subjective judgements, ‘The introduotion is an attempt to provide some of the essential information on which German etymology is based, and reference to this will often be helpful in making clear, the forms quoted from Sanskait and other languages. A perianal unig, fate te which ttenton mat be drewn is the supplement by Miss Winder giving the logies Ge lage mule of MEG worte which fave Sauppesl Son the modern language, but which are continually met with in the classical texts of the period xound about 1200, It is # curious fact that no etymological dictionary of such words existe; thi supplement is therefore a uzeful conizibution towards filling a gap. M. 0'0, WALSHE, ‘Norman, February 1980, 1 This ison oxtraot from a thesia aubsaitted by her forthe degree of Mastor of Arts ofthe University of Nottingham,INTRODUCTION yx language which this dictionary seeks to explain is the New High German Literary Language (neulochdewlsche Schrifteprache). This, like Standard English, is an abstrac- ion, and should perhaps best bo regarded. as the ideal language which educated persons from all parts of the German linguistic area aim at reprodncing in speech and waiting. It has a special social position and function above and beside the numerous German dialects co-existing with it, and out of which, by a curious and complex provess, it gradually emerged as a result of cartain quite definite social and political conditions, It is important to note that this standard Ianguage—the language of books, newspapers, radio, churohes, schools, and official institations generally—has not been in existence for very Jong, even as an ideal, nor need it be assumed that it will necessarily always remain in existence : changod sovial conditions might leed to its disappearance or splitting-up. gi. §2. Before the appearance of a standard German language— the first emergence of which is usually associated with Luther's translation of the New Tostament in 1622—there were only the various dialects of the different regions, Franconian, Alemannio, Bavarian, and so on. Round about 1200 there was indeed a marked tendenoy towards a unification of the language for literary purposes, Dut only within the narrow framework of the feudal society of the day, and the unity, incomploto as it was, did not survive the break-up of that society: moreover, it was based on a rather different group of dialects from the Inter stondard language, of hich it is therefore not the direct ancestor. Written records in German dato from about-A.p. 740, and it is usual to divide the “history of the German Ianguage into three periods: Old High German (OHG) is the name given to the language between 740 and about 1050. From 1050 onwards the language found is referred to as Middle High German (MHG). This may be said to extend till about 1600, but after 1950 or so itis umually qualified as Late MHG. jew High German (NH@) extends from rougiily 1500 to the present day, but the language of the early part of this period (about 1500