dort

Forms

dort (adverb; archaic and regional by-form dorten)^[2][1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle High German dort, inherited from Old High German tharot, beside dorot and thorot, inherited from Proto-West Germanic *þārud (“thither”).^[3][4][1] It was formed from Proto-Germanic *þar (“there”), the short-vowelled variant of the adverb behind da, with a West Germanic suffix that marked direction, also seen in Old High German herot (“hither”) beside hier (“here”) and in warot (“whither”).^[3][4][5] The formation is found only in German and its neighbours: Old Saxon tharod (“thither”), Middle Low German dōrt and Old Frisian thard (“thither”).^[4][6] Dutch, English and the Scandinavian languages use other words for “there”.^[7]

Pfeifer and Orel connect the suffix with Sanskrit उत (utá, “and, also”) and Ancient Greek ἠύτε (ēúte, “just as”), and so with the pronominal root Proto-Indo-European *au- (“that one”);^[4][5] the revised Grimms' dictionary considers either a link with the ending of Latin aliuta (“otherwise”) or with the suffix of -wärts.^[8]

Forms with umlaut, teret in Notker, dert and dialect forms with ⟨ö⟩ and ⟨e⟩, are explained by the frequent combination of the adverb with the present tense of sein.^[9][8]

Earliest recorded meaning

Old High German tharot is first recorded in Otfrid (863–871), then in the Ludwigslied and Notker.^[10][11] It first meant “thither”, as Old Saxon tharod still did: in the Ludwigslied (881/2) God hiez her Hluduigan tharot sar ritan “bade Louis ride there at once”.^[8][6] Already in Old High German it could also mean “there, in that place”.^[12]

Semantic evolution

From Middle High German on, dort means “in that place”, pointing more emphatically than da to a place away from the speaker.^[6][4][8] Middle High German also used it for “in the other world, in the life to come”, as opposed to hie “here, in this life”.^[13][14] Adelung, around 1800, still cites hier und dort glücklich “happy here and hereafter”.^[15]

Around 1500 a by-form dorten appeared, modelled on oben and drüben; it is now regional or elevated.^[12][4] The adjective dortig is dated to the 14th century by Paul, but to the 16th century by Pfeifer and the Duden, who say it became common in the 18th.^[12][4][6] Luther still used dortwärts, where the old sense of direction shows through.^[12]

Timeline

• 863–871 – Old High German tharot is used by Otfrid.^[10]
• 881/2 – The Ludwigslied uses tharot for “thither”.^[8]
• c. 1000 – Notker has the umlauted form teret.^[8][9]
• c. 1500 – The by-form dorten appears.^[12][4]
• 16th century – dortig is recorded according to Pfeifer.^[4]

Meanings

Adverb

1. At that place, there, usually further from the speaker than da: Siehst du den Turm dort drüben?^[2][1][16]
2. (with prepositions) von dort “from there”, nach dort “to there”.^[2]

Word family

• dortig
• dorthin
• dorther
• dorten
• alldort

Related words

• da
• hier

Usage notes

A separate masculine noun Dort, also Durt, from Old High German turd, names weeds growing in cereal fields such as darnel and brome; it is recorded from an 8th-century gloss on zizania and is still found in Austria, but its origin is uncertain.^[17][15]

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c Duden. Das große Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache in zehn Bänden (1999), 3rd ed., Mannheim: Dudenverlag
3. ^ a b Kluge, Friedrich; Seebold, Elmar (2011), Etymologisches Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache, 25th ed., Berlin / Boston: De Gruyter, p. 212
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. ^ a b Orel, Vladimir (2003), A Handbook of Germanic Etymology, Leiden / Boston: Brill
6. ^ a b c d Duden. Das Herkunftswörterbuch: Etymologie der deutschen Sprache (2020), 6th ed., Duden vol. 7, Berlin: Dudenverlag
7. ^ Grimm, Jacob; Grimm, Wilhelm (1854–1961), Deutsches Wörterbuch, 16 vols. in 32, Leipzig: Hirzel; digital: Wörterbuchnetz, Trier Center for Digital Humanities, p. 2, 1304
8. ^ a b c d e f 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, 1286
9. ^ a b Althochdeutsches Wörterbuch (1952–), founded by Elisabeth Karg-Gasterstädt and Theodor Frings, Sächsische Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Leipzig, Berlin: Akademie-Verlag / De Gruyter; online awb.saw-leipzig.de, p. 2, 311
10. ^ a b Köbler, Gerhard (2014), Althochdeutsches Wörterbuch, 6th ed., online, koeblergerhard.de/wikiling
11. ^ Schützeichel, Rudolf (2012), Althochdeutsches Wörterbuch, 7th ed., Berlin / Boston: De Gruyter, p. 69
12. ^ a b c d e Paul, Hermann (2002), Deutsches Wörterbuch: Bedeutungsgeschichte und Aufbau unseres Wortschatzes, 10th ed., ed. Helmut Henne, Heidrun Kämper and Georg Objartel, Tübingen: Niemeyer
13. ^ Lexer, Matthias (1872–1878), Mittelhochdeutsches Handwörterbuch, 3 vols., Leipzig: Hirzel; digital: Wörterbuchnetz, Trier Center for Digital Humanities, p. 1, 454
14. ^ Anderson, Robert R.; Goebel, Ulrich; Reichmann, Oskar, eds. (1989–), Frühneuhochdeutsches Wörterbuch, Berlin / New York: De Gruyter; FWB-online, fwb-online.de
15. ^ a b Adelung, Johann Christoph (1793–1801), Grammatisch-kritisches Wörterbuch der Hochdeutschen Mundart, 2nd ed., 4 vols., Leipzig: Breitkopf
16. ^ Wiktionary, das freie Wörterbuch (German Wiktionary), de.wiktionary.org
17. ^ 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, 1288