Etymologically
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dieser

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Pronunciation

  • /ˈdiːzər/, [ˈdiːzɐ][1]
  • Austria, southern Germany: [ˈd̥iːz̥ɐ][1]
  • Switzerland: [ˈd̥iːz̥ər][1]
  • Western Germany, colloquial: /ˈdɪzər/, [ˈdɪzɐ][1]

Forms

dieser m, diese f, dieses or dies n (demonstrative pronoun)[2] In modern German it is declined like a strong adjective.[3] Middle High German had diser, usually dirre, feminine disiu, neuter ditze or diz.[4][5] Dirre is found until the end of the 15th century, mainly in the west of the Upper German area, and Swabian diz into the 16th century.[6]

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle High German diser, inherited from Old High German desēr, feminine desiu, neuter diz.[4][1] The same formation is Old Saxon these (feminine thius), Old Frisian this and Old English þes, with Old Norse showing it only in some forms such as the genitive þessa.[4] Dutch deze and English this continue it.[4][7]

The reinforced demonstrative was made from the simple demonstrative der (Proto-Germanic *sa) with an attached deictic particle, -si in Old Norse and -se or -s in West Germanic, which Duden traces to the pronoun stem Proto-Indo-European *so.[4][3][7][8] At first only the pronoun was inflected, inside the word, not the particle; a last relic is the genitive desse in the Muspilli poem.[4] Then the inflection moved to the end of the word, and this state is already reached when Old High German is first written down.[4][3] The formation is found only in West and North Germanic.[3]

Between the 9th and 11th centuries the stem vowel ⟨e⟩ became ⟨i⟩, probably by analogy.[3][4] In forms with ⟨r⟩ in the ending the ⟨s⟩ was assimilated (genitive plural thesero > therro > dirro in Notker), and the forms with ⟨rr⟩ spread to the nominative singular in the 11th century, lasting until the 16th century.[3] The ⟨z⟩ of the neuter goes back to a Germanic double ⟨tt⟩, as in þetta.[8]

Earliest recorded meaning

Old High German desēr is recorded in glosses of 765 and then in most of the literary texts, from the Benedictine Rule and the Exhortatio to Notker, meaning “this” and also simply “the”.[9][10]

Semantic evolution

The pronoun points to what is nearest the speaker in space or time, and so also to what has just been mentioned;[11] dieser und jener means “one or another”, and regionally it served in curses as a veiled name for the devil.[11] Its genitive is used only before a noun: one says in dessen Haus, not in dieses Haus; old commercial phrases such as Überbringer dieses (“bearer of this [letter]”) and am 15. dieses (“on the 15th of this [month]”) were the exception.[11]

Derivatives include diesseits, an adverb from the 14th century (Middle High German dissīt “on this side”), and its noun Diesseits “earthly life”, coined in the early 19th century as the opposite of Jenseits.[11][7] Diesjährig “of this year” arose in the 18th century from the accusative dies Jahr.[7]

Timeline

  • 765 – Old High German desēr in glosses.[9]
  • 11th century – The form dirro appears in the nominative singular.[3]
  • 14th century – First record of the adverb diesseits.[11]
  • 16th century – The rr forms (Middle High German dirre) die out.[3]
  • Second half of the 16th century – Bavarian ditz(e) is last recorded.[8]
  • 18th century – diesjährig is formed from dies Jahr.[7]
  • 1805 – Diesseits is used as a noun, opposed to Jenseits.[11]

Meanings

Pronoun

  1. this, these: points to someone or something near the speaker (dieser Platz ist frei).[2][1]
  2. This, that: refers back to something already mentioned or known and singles it out.[2]
  3. With words of time, the present or nearest one: diesen Sommer, diese Nacht, dieser Tage “in the next few days”.[2]
  4. Before a name or a word for a person, expressing a (usually negative) judgement: dieser Herr Meier.[2]
  5. Standing alone, refers to something said before or after; beside jener, “the latter”.[2]

Word family

  • diesbezüglich
  • diesjährig
  • diesmal
  • diesseits
  • ohnedies
  • überdies
  • diesseitig

Usage notes

Dies und das or dieses und jenes means “all sorts of things”;[2] dieser und jener “some people” and dieser oder jener “one or another”.[2] In the neuter, dies is the usual standalone form (dies ist richtig).[2]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i Duden. Das große Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache in zehn Bänden (1999), 3rd ed., Mannheim: Dudenverlag
  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 e f g h Kluge, Friedrich; Seebold, Elmar (2011), Etymologisches Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache, 25th ed., Berlin / Boston: De Gruyter, p. 200
  5. ^ Lexer, Matthias (1872–1878), Mittelhochdeutsches Handwörterbuch, 3 vols., Leipzig: Hirzel; digital: Wörterbuchnetz, Trier Center for Digital Humanities
  6. ^ Anderson, Robert R.; Goebel, Ulrich; Reichmann, Oskar, eds. (1989–), Frühneuhochdeutsches Wörterbuch, Berlin / New York: De Gruyter; FWB-online, fwb-online.de
  7. ^ a b c d e Duden. Das Herkunftswörterbuch: Etymologie der deutschen Sprache (2020), 6th ed., Duden vol. 7, Berlin: Dudenverlag
  8. ^ a b c Deutsches Wörterbuch von Jacob Grimm und Wilhelm Grimm, Neubearbeitung (1965–2018), ed. Berlin-Brandenburgische Akademie der Wissenschaften and Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Göttingen, 9 vols. (A–F), Leipzig / Stuttgart: Hirzel, p. 6, 1024
  9. ^ a b Köbler, Gerhard (2014), Althochdeutsches Wörterbuch, 6th ed., online, koeblergerhard.de/wikiling
  10. ^ Schützeichel, Rudolf (2012), Althochdeutsches Wörterbuch, 7th ed., Berlin / Boston: De Gruyter, p. 71
  11. ^ a b c d e f Paul, Hermann (2002), Deutsches Wörterbuch: Bedeutungsgeschichte und Aufbau unseres Wortschatzes, 10th ed., ed. Helmut Henne, Heidrun Kämper and Georg Objartel, Tübingen: Niemeyer