Etymologically
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führen

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Pronunciation

  • /ˈfyːʁən/, [ˈfyːʁən], [ˈfyːɐn][1]

Forms

führen (third-person singular present führt, past tense führte, past participle geführt, auxiliary haben)[1] Middle High German had the umlauted present vüeren, caused by the old /j/ of the suffix, beside the past vuorte without umlaut.[2]

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle High German vüeren, inherited from Old High German fuoren, inherited from Proto-West Germanic *fōrijan, inherited from Proto-Germanic *fōrijaną (“to cause to go, lead”), the causative of Proto-Germanic *faraną (“to go, travel”), the source of fahren.[3][4][1] It has the lengthened-grade vowel /ō/ beside the /a/ of the base verb, and so first meant “to make go, set in motion”, then “to bring” and “to lead”.[3][5][6] The same verb is Old Saxon fōrian, Old Frisian fēra, Old English fēran and Old Norse fœra, and today Dutch voeren, Swedish föra and Icelandic færa.[3][4] No Gothic form is recorded, and English has lost the word.[2]

Kluge compares the similar pair Sanskrit पारयति (pāráyati, “takes across”) beside पिपर्ति (píparti, “brings over”), from Proto-Indo-European *per-, but does not rule out that two roots of the same shape are involved, one meaning “to travel” and one “to pass through, bring across”.[3][7]

The Grimms' revised dictionary notes that the modern verb also absorbed a second Old High German verb fuorōn of unclear origin, perhaps from the noun fuora, which meant “to feed, provide for” and lived on in Upper German until the 16th century.[8][9]

Earliest recorded meaning

Old High German fuoren is first recorded in glosses of about 765, and then in the Hildebrandslied, Tatian, Otfrid, Notker and Williram.[7][10] It meant “to bring, carry, transport”, “to lead, conduct” and “to bear with oneself”, and with in muate “to intend”.[11][10]

Semantic evolution

Middle High German vüeren meant “to set in motion, drive, carry away”, “to lead, bring”, “to carry out” and “to possess”.[4][12] Wahrig notes that “to lead, direct”, the main sense today, belongs to New High German.[13] The old sense “to transport by vehicle” was still current around 1800, when Adelung explains that merchants were said to führen the goods they dealt in because wandering traders used to carry them around.[14] The Grimms' revised dictionary finds this transport sense dying out from the 19th century.[8]

In sport führen has meant “to be in first place” since the second half of the 19th century.[15] From there it spread to leading positions in science, trade and industry (ein führendes Unternehmen).[15] Among the derivatives, Führer goes back to Old High German fuorāri “porter” of the 8th century, and Führung is recorded from the 15th century.[4] aufführen first meant “to raise” a building, then in the 17th century “to lead forward in a procession” and in the 18th “to perform on the stage”.[4][5] Anführungszeichen “quotation marks” (18th century) is a loan translation of Latin signum citationis.[5][13]

Timeline

  • c. 765 – Old High German fuoren appears in glosses.[7]
  • 8th century – fuorāri “porter”, the ancestor of Führer, is recorded.[4]
  • 15th century – Führung appears.[4]
  • 17th century – aufführen means “to lead forward in a procession”.[4]
  • 18th century – aufführen is used of theatre performances, and Anführungszeichen is formed.[4][5]
  • 2nd half of the 19th century – The sports sense “to be in the lead” appears.[15]

Meanings

Verb

  1. To lead or guide someone, going along and showing the way: eine alte Dame über die Kreuzung führen.[6][1]
  2. To take someone to a place: Er führte seine Mutter in ein Restaurant.[6]
  3. To be in charge of, manage: a business, a household, a team.[6][1]
  4. (reflexive) To behave, conduct oneself over a period, as judged by others.[6][1]
  5. To be in the lead, be at the top.[6][1]
  6. To handle, move in a particular way: a brush, a weapon.[6][1]
  7. Of a road or path, to go in a direction; to lead to a result: Das führt zu nichts.[6][16]
  8. (officialese) To drive a vehicle;[6][1] (Austria) to transport someone in a vehicle.[6][1]
  9. To have with one, carry; to stock or sell goods: Diese Marke führen wir nicht.[6][1]
  10. To bear as a mark or title: a name, a coat of arms.[6]
  11. To conduct, hold: a conversation, negotiations, a war.[6][1]
  12. To keep a record: a diary, a list, accounts.[6]

Word family

  • Führer
  • Führung
  • abführen
  • anführen
  • Anführungszeichen
  • aufführen
  • Aufführung
  • ausführen
  • durchführen
  • einführen
  • entführen
  • verführen
  • vorführen
  • überführen

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b Grimm, Jacob; Grimm, Wilhelm (1854–1961), Deutsches Wörterbuch, 16 vols. in 32, Leipzig: Hirzel; digital: Wörterbuchnetz, Trier Center for Digital Humanities, p. 4, 431
  3. ^ a b c d Kluge, Friedrich; Seebold, Elmar (2011), Etymologisches Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache, 25th ed., Berlin / Boston: De Gruyter, p. 322
  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 c d Duden. Das Herkunftswörterbuch: Etymologie der deutschen Sprache (2014), 5th ed., Duden vol. 7, Berlin / Mannheim / Zürich: Dudenverlag
  6. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Duden. Das große Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache in zehn Bänden (1999), 3rd ed., Mannheim: Dudenverlag
  7. ^ a b c Köbler, Gerhard (2014), Althochdeutsches Wörterbuch, 6th ed., online, koeblergerhard.de/wikiling
  8. ^ a b 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. 9, 1206
  9. ^ Grimm, Jacob; Grimm, Wilhelm (1854–1961), Deutsches Wörterbuch, 16 vols. in 32, Leipzig: Hirzel; digital: Wörterbuchnetz, Trier Center for Digital Humanities, p. 4, 459
  10. ^ a b Schützeichel, Rudolf (2012), Althochdeutsches Wörterbuch, 7th ed., Berlin / Boston: De Gruyter, p. 117
  11. ^ Lloyd, Albert L.; Springer, Otto; Lühr, Rosemarie, et al. (1988–), Etymologisches Wörterbuch des Althochdeutschen, Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht; online ewa.saw-leipzig.de, p. 3, 639
  12. ^ Lexer, Matthias (1872–1878), Mittelhochdeutsches Handwörterbuch, 3 vols., Leipzig: Hirzel; digital: Wörterbuchnetz, Trier Center for Digital Humanities, p. 3, 557
  13. ^ a b Wahrig-Burfeind, Renate, ed., Wahrig Herkunftswörterbuch, Gütersloh / München: Wissen Media Verlag; online edition at wissen.de
  14. ^ Adelung, Johann Christoph (1793–1801), Grammatisch-kritisches Wörterbuch der Hochdeutschen Mundart, 2nd ed., 4 vols., Leipzig: Breitkopf
  15. ^ a b c Paul, Hermann (2002), Deutsches Wörterbuch: Bedeutungsgeschichte und Aufbau unseres Wortschatzes, 10th ed., ed. Helmut Henne, Heidrun Kämper and Georg Objartel, Tübingen: Niemeyer
  16. ^ Wiktionary, das freie Wörterbuch (German Wiktionary), de.wiktionary.org