Etymologically
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Wasser

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Pronunciation

Forms

Wasser n (genitive Wassers, plural Wasser or Wässer, diminutive Wässerchen n or Wässerlein n)[1] The regular plural has no umlaut;[2] Wässer is found occasionally from the 16th century and more often from the 17th, partly under the influence of Gewässer.[2] Today Wässer is the plural for kinds of water and watery liquids.[3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle High German wazzer, inherited from Old High German wazzar, inherited from Proto-West Germanic *watar, inherited from Proto-Germanic *watōr (“water”).[4][1][5] West Germanic has the same r-stem in Old Saxon watar, Old English wæter and Old Frisian weter, and in the modern Dutch water and English water.[4][6] North and East Germanic have an n-stem instead: Gothic 𐍅𐌰𐍄𐍉 (watō) and Old Norse vatn, whence Swedish vatten.[4][6][5]

Both continue an Indo-European noun with /r/ in the nominative and accusative and /n/ in the other cases, a pattern best kept in Hittite watar, genitive wetenaš.[4][6] The same word is Ancient Greek ὕδωρ (húdōr), Sanskrit उदन् (udán), Old Church Slavonic вода (voda) and Old Irish uisce, and with a nasal infix Lithuanian vanduõ.[4][6] Wiktionary reconstructs Proto-Indo-European *wédōr, a collective of *wódr̥.[1] Kroonen notes that the Germanic forms point to the o-grade, while an e-grade survives in the name of the Swedish lake Vättern.[5] The animal name Otter belongs to the same word.[4][7]

Pfeifer and the Duden dictionary see in the noun a dental extension of a root Proto-Indo-European *au̯- (“to wet, moisten, flow”), also found in Latin unda (“wave”) and उनत्ति (unátti, “wets”).[6][7] Kluge only raises the question whether such verbs continue a verb underlying the noun.[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Old High German wazzar is first recorded in glosses of about 765, and then in the Isidor translation, the Monsee Fragments, Tatian, Otfrid and Notker.[8][9] It meant “water” and also “body of water, river, sea”.[9][8] In Middle High German wazzer was the usual word for a river, where modern German says Fluss.[10][11]

Semantic evolution

Luther still calls the four rivers of Eden Hauptwasser.[10] The word was also used for fluids of the body, such as urine and saliva, and often for tears from Middle High German on, and since about 1300 for prepared liquids used as drinks or medicines, as in gebranntes Wasser “spirits”, Kirschwasser and Kölnisch Wasser.[10][12] Since the 16th century it has also measured the clarity of gems, as in ein Diamant reinsten Wassers, which Jean Paul applied to poets vom ersten Wasser.[10]

Many phrases have dated first records.[6][10] Stille Wasser sind tief “still waters run deep” is found from the 16th century, sich über Wasser halten from the 1730s, Wasser auf seine Mühle from the 18th century and ins Wasser fallen “to be called off” probably only from the end of the 19th century.[6][10] Jemandem das Wasser abgraben “to cut the ground from under someone's feet” dates from about 1900.[6] Hebrew kirsh “kirsch” is among the German loans.[13]

Timeline

  • c. 765 – Old High German wazzar appears in glosses.[8]
  • 10th century – Old High German wazzarsuht “dropsy” is recorded.[6]
  • c. 1300 – Wasser is used for prepared liquids for drinking and healing.[10]
  • 16th century – Stille Wasser sind tief is recorded, and the umlauted plural Wässer appears.[6][2]
  • 1733–1739 – sich über Wasser halten is recorded.[10]
  • 1791 – Girtanner coins Wasserstoff “hydrogen” after French hydrogène.[6]
  • c. 1900 – jemandem das Wasser abgraben is recorded.[6]

Meanings

Noun

  1. water, the clear liquid compound of hydrogen and oxygen: Ich trinke lieber Wasser als Saft.[3][1]
  2. The water of a sea, lake or river: Das Wasser im See ist noch kalt.[3]
  3. A body of water, such as a river or lake (plural Wasser).[3][1]
  4. A watery liquid, often alcoholic, such as a fruit brandy or a toilet water (plural Wässer).[3][1]
  5. Fluid that forms in the body; colloquially sweat, euphemistically urine, and tears.[3][1]
  6. (colloquial) Short for Mineralwasser or Tafelwasser.[1]

Word family

  • Gewässer
  • wässern
  • wässerig
  • verwässern
  • Wasserfall
  • Wasserkopf
  • Wassermann
  • Wasserstoff
  • Wassersucht
  • Hochwasser
  • Grundwasser
  • Trinkwasser
  • Kirschwasser
  • Otter
  • waschen
  • Wodka
  • Whisky
  • English water

Usage notes

Jemandem nicht das Wasser reichen können “not to be a patch on someone” goes back to the medieval custom of having servants hand water round for washing the hands at meals.[14][3] Mit Wasser kochen “to be no better than others” first referred to poor households that cooked with water instead of wine or broth.[3]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c Grimm, Jacob; Grimm, Wilhelm (1854–1961), Deutsches Wörterbuch, 16 vols. in 32, Leipzig: Hirzel; digital: Wörterbuchnetz, Trier Center for Digital Humanities, p. 27, 2295
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h Duden. Das große Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache in zehn Bänden (1999), 3rd ed., Mannheim: Dudenverlag
  4. ^ a b c d e f g Kluge, Friedrich; Seebold, Elmar (2011), Etymologisches Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache, 25th ed., Berlin / Boston: De Gruyter, p. 973
  5. ^ a b c Kroonen, Guus (2013), Etymological Dictionary of Proto-Germanic, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 11, Leiden / Boston: Brill
  6. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Pfeifer, Wolfgang, et al. (1993), Etymologisches Wörterbuch des Deutschen, 2nd ed., Berlin: Akademie-Verlag; digital revised version in the DWDS, dwds.de
  7. ^ a b Duden. Das Herkunftswörterbuch: Etymologie der deutschen Sprache (2020), 6th ed., Duden vol. 7, Berlin: Dudenverlag, p. 921
  8. ^ a b c Köbler, Gerhard (2014), Althochdeutsches Wörterbuch, 6th ed., online, koeblergerhard.de/wikiling
  9. ^ a b Schützeichel, Rudolf (2012), Althochdeutsches Wörterbuch, 7th ed., Berlin / Boston: De Gruyter, p. 374
  10. ^ 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
  11. ^ Lexer, Matthias (1872–1878), Mittelhochdeutsches Handwörterbuch, 3 vols., Leipzig: Hirzel; digital: Wörterbuchnetz, Trier Center for Digital Humanities, p. 3, 707
  12. ^ Köbler, Gerhard (2014), Mittelhochdeutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., online, koeblergerhard.de/wikiling
  13. ^ Lehnwortportal Deutsch (2012–), Leibniz-Institut für Deutsche Sprache, Mannheim, lwp.ids-mannheim.de
  14. ^ Wahrig-Burfeind, Renate, ed., Wahrig Herkunftswörterbuch, Gütersloh / München: Wissen Media Verlag; online edition at wissen.de