Etymologically
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Schule

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Pronunciation

  • /ˈʃuːlə/[1]

Forms

Schule f (genitive Schule, plural Schulen)[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle High German schuole, inherited from Old High German scuola, borrowed from Latin schola (“lecture, school”), borrowed in the sphere of the monasteries.[2][3][4][5] The Old High German diphthong shows that the word was taken over when the Latin vowel had already been lengthened, probably around the 6th century.[3][2] The Latin word was itself borrowed from Ancient Greek σχολή (scholḗ, “rest, leisure; learned talk, lecture, school”), properly “a pause from work”, which belongs to the stem of ἔχω (ékhō, “to have, hold, hold back”).[2][3][4][6]

The word was borrowed in the same way into Old English scōl, Old Norse skóli and Middle Low German schōle, and it is today Dutch school, English school, French école and Swedish skola; of the Germanic languages only Gothic lacks it.[2][3][5]

The sense “shoal of fish” is explained differently.[2][7] Kluge derives it from the same word, since Late Latin also used it for a troop of warriors and Greek for various gatherings.[2] The Duden dictionary takes this sense from the English homonym meaning “shoal”, of West Germanic origin (compare Old Saxon scola (“troop, group”)) and perhaps related to Scholle, which was felt to be the same word.[7]

Earliest recorded meaning

Old High German scuola is first recorded in the Benedictine Rule (about 800), and then in glosses and in Notker, meaning “school”.[8][9] Kluge dates it to the 9th century.[2]

Semantic evolution

Like Kirche, the word names both the place of teaching, at first including the university (hohe schuole ze Paris, about 1300), and the teaching itself, as in zur Schule gehen (16th century).[5] Aus der Schule schwatzen (16th century), now aus der Schule plaudern, means “to give away secrets”.[5] From Middle High German on it was used figuratively for training, as in ein schuol der tugent and die Schule des Lebens; in riding, the Hohe Schule is the art of advanced dressage, and a Baumschule is a tree nursery.[5]

It also came to mean a movement in science or art going back to a master, as in Heine's Die romantische Schule, and Schule machen “to set an example that others follow”.[5][7] The agent noun Schüler, Old High German scuolāri (9th century), was probably influenced by Late Latin scholaris;[3][4] schulen “to train” is recorded from the 18th century.[3][4] The German word passed into Hungarian as suli (1900) and into Hebrew.[10]

Timeline

  • c. 800 – Old High German scuola appears in the Benedictine Rule.[8]
  • 9th century – scuolāri “pupil” is recorded.[3]
  • c. 1300 – hohe schuole is used of the university of Paris.[5]
  • 16th century – zur Schule gehen and aus der Schule schwatzen are recorded.[5]
  • 18th century – The verb schulen appears.[3]
  • 1900 – Hungarian suli is recorded.[10]

Meanings

Noun

  1. A school, an institution where children and young people are taught: eine private Schule besuchen.[7][1]
  2. A school building.[7]
  3. Lessons, school as an activity: morgen ist keine Schule.[7][5]
  4. Training, schooling that develops someone's abilities.[7]
  5. The teachers and pupils of a school.[7][5]
  6. A movement in art or science that goes back to a master and is carried on by followers.[7][1]
  7. A textbook for an art or instrument, as in Gitarrenschule.[7][5]
  8. Short for Baumschule, a tree nursery.[7]
  9. (zoology) A shoal of fish; also a pod of whales.[7][1]
  10. (archaic) A synagogue.[1]

Word family

  • Schüler
  • Schülerin
  • schulen
  • Schulung
  • Baumschule
  • Grundschule
  • Hochschule
  • Schulmedizin
  • einschulen

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g Kluge, Friedrich; Seebold, Elmar (2011), Etymologisches Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache, 25th ed., Berlin / Boston: De Gruyter, p. 829
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h Pfeifer, Wolfgang, et al. (1993), Etymologisches Wörterbuch des Deutschen, 2nd ed., Berlin: Akademie-Verlag; digital revised version in the DWDS, dwds.de
  4. ^ a b c d Duden. Das Herkunftswörterbuch: Etymologie der deutschen Sprache (2020), 6th ed., Duden vol. 7, Berlin: Dudenverlag, p. 760
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Paul, Hermann (2002), Deutsches Wörterbuch: Bedeutungsgeschichte und Aufbau unseres Wortschatzes, 10th ed., ed. Helmut Henne, Heidrun Kämper and Georg Objartel, Tübingen: Niemeyer
  6. ^ Wahrig-Burfeind, Renate, ed., Wahrig Herkunftswörterbuch, Gütersloh / München: Wissen Media Verlag; online edition at wissen.de
  7. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Duden. Das große Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache in zehn Bänden (1999), 3rd ed., Mannheim: Dudenverlag
  8. ^ a b Köbler, Gerhard (2014), Althochdeutsches Wörterbuch, 6th ed., online, koeblergerhard.de/wikiling
  9. ^ Schützeichel, Rudolf (2012), Althochdeutsches Wörterbuch, 7th ed., Berlin / Boston: De Gruyter, p. 295
  10. ^ a b Lehnwortportal Deutsch (2012–), Leibniz-Institut für Deutsche Sprache, Mannheim, lwp.ids-mannheim.de