The Genius of the German Language

Written by eklastic

(Eat your heart out, Mark Twain!)

This post is for all those who at one time or another have made fun of German and its ability to form seemingly endless compound nouns, e.g. Verkehrswegeplanungsbeschleunigungsgesetz or Gleichgewichtsdichtegradientenzentrifugation.

In fact, the ability to create compound nouns can be quite efficient. Like any creation with the word “Zeug”, i.e. stuff.

Spielzeug / playing stuff aka a toy

Flugzeug / flying stuff aka an airplane

Schreibzeug / writing stuff aka pens, pencils, erasers, sharpeners etc.

Grünzeug / green stuff aka vegetables, particularly but not necessarily green vergetables

Viehzeug / animal stuff aka smaller animals, pets or critters

And quite a few more.

Ragtag Daily Prompt: Stuff

11 thoughts on “The Genius of the German Language”

  1. I never had a problem with compound nouns. With a basic knowledge of German you always know what people are talking about. However. why about 12 different forms for the word “the” according to whether it is Nominitativ, Akuisativ, Dativ or Genetiv And then prepositions durch, ohne, gegen, wieder, um, für that take the akkusativ case instead of dativ. We learnt it as DOGWUF in the english lesson. Surely one word “the” does it just as well. And now on top of it all I speak Swiss German, although der die das usw becomes “d” which I find genial. Und jetzt weiter in mein English welche nicht mehr so rein ist wie es war. Ich wunsche ein schöner Tag.

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    1. Gottfriedli! I admire anybody who manages German cases. The only consolation I can offer is that Russian knows six cases, Latin five, and Hungarian 27! And to be honest growing up with German at least prepares you a bit for cases in other languages. I never understand that (uneducated) English speaker cannot understand the difference between who and whom and totally lose it when they say things like: “The mayor invited Matthew and I.” and then think they are speaking good (sic).

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      1. just to add I learnt Russian for 12 years and know the six cases, although not without making mistakes, this was many years ago, but I can still read and write Kyrillisch, they also have two types of verbs.

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