Grenze

Forms

Grenze f (genitive Grenze, plural Grenzen)^[1] Until the first half of the 19th century it was also spelt Gränze.^[2]

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle High German grenize, borrowed from Polish granica (“boundary mark, border”).^[3][4][5] Pfeifer names Old Polish as the source and says it was borrowed along the whole length of the Polish–German border region,^[4] while Kluge speaks of the Slavic languages in general and Duden of a West Slavic one.^[3][6] The Slavic word is also Czech hranice and Russian граница (granica), from Proto-Slavic *granica, a derivative of Proto-Slavic *granь (“edge, corner”).^[1][3] Pfeifer and Duden connect that root with Granne “awn”.^[4][6]

German passed the word on to Dutch grens, Swedish gräns and Norwegian Bokmål grense.^[3][1] Kluge thinks it replaced the native Mark because that word meant a border region rather than a line, and no longer fitted the newer idea of a frontier.^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

The word was taken over in the lands of the Teutonic Order around the middle of the 13th century: the renewed Kulm charter of 1251 still translates Latin termini with gemerke, but a Thorn charter of 1262 has an unser granizze “at our border”.^[7][8] Latin charters of the region used it too, as granicia, from 1283.^[7]

Semantic evolution

The word was in general use in Upper Saxon by the 14th century and moved west into Low and High German in the 14th and 15th centuries; it appears in a Hanseatic recess of 1437 and reached the West Central German area in the first half of the 16th century.^[4][7] Kluge, Wahrig and Pfeifer credit Luther, whose Bible uses only this word, with its acceptance in the standard language.^[3][9][4] By about 1700 it was found everywhere, and older words such as Mark, Gemerk, Rain and Scheide became dialectal, changed their meaning or died out.^[4]

From the 16th to the 18th century the plural could mean “territory”, as in die Grenzen eines Landes.^[2] From the 18th century the word was used figuratively for a limit or the furthest possibility, often in the plural (die Grenzen der Tugend, 1721/22, and Goethe's poem Grenzen der Menschheit); grenzenlos dates from the first half of the 18th century.^[2] The verb grenzen is recorded from 1336, and around 1900 mathematics and engineering added Grenzwert.^[2] The word was borrowed into Hungarian as gránic (1782).^[10]

Timeline

• 1251 – The Kulm charter still uses gemerke for “boundaries”.^[7]
• 1262 – granizze in a charter from Thorn.^[7][8]
• 1336 – First record of the verb grenzen.^[2]
• 14th century – In general use in Upper Saxon.^[4]
• 1437 – Low German grensze in a recess of the Hanseatic diet.^[7]
• 16th century – Luther's Bible uses only Grenze.^[4]
• c. 1700 – Current throughout the German-speaking area.^[4]
• 1721/22 – Figurative die Gräntzen der Tugend “the limits of virtue”.^[2]
• c. 1900 – Grenzwert in mathematics and engineering.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. A border, frontier between states: Die Grenze zwischen den beiden Ländern verläuft entlang des Flusses. (colloquial) über die grüne Grenze gehen, to cross illegally away from a checkpoint.^[11][1]
2. A boundary between properties or natural areas: die Grenze des Gartens.^[11][1]
3. An imagined dividing line between different areas or things: die Grenze zwischen Spiel und Ernst.^[11]
4. A limit: Ihre Geduld hat Grenzen.^[1][2]

Word family

• begrenzen
• grenzen
• abgrenzen
• ausgrenzen
• eingrenzen
• grenzenlos
• grenzwertig
• Grenzer
• Grenzwert

Related words

• Granne
• Mark

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h Paul, Hermann (2002), Deutsches Wörterbuch: Bedeutungsgeschichte und Aufbau unseres Wortschatzes, 10th ed., ed. Helmut Henne, Heidrun Kämper and Georg Objartel, Tübingen: Niemeyer
3. ^ a b c d e f Kluge, Friedrich; Seebold, Elmar (2011), Etymologisches Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache, 25th ed., Berlin / Boston: De Gruyter, p. 374
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i Pfeifer, Wolfgang, et al. (1993), Etymologisches Wörterbuch des Deutschen, 2nd ed., Berlin: Akademie-Verlag; digital revised version in the DWDS, dwds.de
5. ^ Lexer, Matthias (1872–1878), Mittelhochdeutsches Handwörterbuch, 3 vols., Leipzig: Hirzel; digital: Wörterbuchnetz, Trier Center for Digital Humanities, p. 1, 1079
6. ^ a b Duden. Das Herkunftswörterbuch: Etymologie der deutschen Sprache (2020), 6th ed., Duden vol. 7, Berlin: Dudenverlag, p. 339
7. ^ a b c d e f Grimm, Jacob; Grimm, Wilhelm (1854–1961), Deutsches Wörterbuch, 16 vols. in 32, Leipzig: Hirzel; digital: Wörterbuchnetz, Trier Center for Digital Humanities, p. 9, 124
8. ^ a b Köbler, Gerhard (2014), Mittelhochdeutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., online, koeblergerhard.de/wikiling
9. ^ Wahrig-Burfeind, Renate, ed., Wahrig Herkunftswörterbuch, Gütersloh / München: Wissen Media Verlag; online edition at wissen.de
10. ^ Lehnwortportal Deutsch (2012–), Leibniz-Institut für Deutsche Sprache, Mannheim, lwp.ids-mannheim.de
11. ^ a b c Duden. Das große Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache in zehn Bänden (1999), 3rd ed., Mannheim: Dudenverlag