Etymologically
Log in

kaufen

This is the current revision of this entry, as edited by bogdan on 20 October 2026 at 19:02. This address is a permanent link to this version.
Changes in this edit History

Pronunciation

  • [ˈkaʊ̯fn̩], [ˈkaʊ̯fən][1]

Forms

kaufen (third-person singular present kauft, past tense kaufte, past participle gekauft, auxiliary haben)[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle High German koufen, inherited from Old High German koufōn, inherited from Proto-West Germanic *kaupōn, inherited from Proto-Germanic *kaupōną (“to trade, buy”).[2][3][1] The same verb is Gothic 𐌺𐌰𐌿𐍀𐍉𐌽 (kaupōn, “to trade”), Old Norse kaupa, Old English ċēapian, Old Saxon kōpian and Dutch kopen.[2][3]

The Germanic verb rests on a very early borrowing from Latin: behind it stands Latin caupō (“innkeeper, petty trader”), which was also taken over as Old High German koufo (“merchant”) and Old English cȳpa.[2][4] Kluge and Duden think that the verbs were borrowed from the Latin derivative caupōnor (“to haggle, huckster”) rather than formed in Germanic from the borrowed noun.[2][5] Pfeifer and Wiktionary prefer the other way, a Germanic verb formed from the noun Proto-Germanic *kaupô (“merchant, innkeeper”).[3][1] According to Pfeifer the Latin word reached the Germans around the beginning of the Christian era through Roman soldiers on the middle and lower Rhine,[3] and Duden points out that the innkeeper who followed the legions sold the wine the Germans prized and was the small trader of the frontier.[5] The Latin noun is usually compared with Ancient Greek κάπηλος (kápēlos, “retail dealer”); neither word has a secure etymology, and both are usually taken to be loanwords.[4]

The noun Kauf is an early back-formation from the verb, and a related English word is cheap.[2][3]

Earliest recorded meaning

Old High German koufen is recorded from the 8th century, first in glosses, then in the Benedictine Rule, the Tatian, Otfrid and Notker.[2][6][7] It meant “to buy, acquire”, but also “to redeem”, “to sell” and “to trade”.[8][6]

Semantic evolution

The verb first covered the whole of trading, both buying and selling, and Middle High German koufen could still mean “to barter” and “to sell”.[5][3] The same breadth shows in the derivatives: Käufer meant both buyer and seller, and until the 16th century also merchant, and Kaufmann meant the buyer as well as the seller into the 18th century.[3] Adelung, around 1800, still knew mit jemandem kaufen “to deal with someone” from everyday speech, but otherwise the meaning had narrowed to “to buy”.[9]

In Early New High German kaufen could also mean “to win someone with money, to bribe” and “to win a spouse by a marriage contract”.[10] The bribing sense survives in colloquial German, as does sich jemanden kaufen “to take someone to task”.[11] Regional forms are umlauted käufen and Low German köpen.[2]

Timeline

  • 8th century – Old High German koufen appears in glosses.[2][6]
  • 8th century – firkoufen, the ancestor of verkaufen, is recorded.[3]
  • 9th century – koufāri “buyer, seller, merchant” and koufman are recorded.[3]
  • 10th–11th century – kouflīh, the ancestor of käuflich, appears.[3]
  • 16th century – Käufer is restricted to the buyer.[3]
  • 17th century – käuflich means only “that can be bought”.[3]

Meanings

Verb

  1. To buy, to purchase: Wir haben das Fahrrad gebraucht gekauft.[11][1]
  2. To shop, to buy one's goods somewhere: Sie kauft nur auf dem Wochenmarkt.[11]
  3. (colloquial) To bribe: Der Zeuge war gekauft.[11][12]
  4. (colloquial) sich jemanden kaufen: to take someone to task: Den kaufe ich mir nach dem Spiel![11]

Word family

  • Käufer
  • käuflich
  • Kaufmann
  • verkaufen
  • Kauf
  • abkaufen
  • ankaufen
  • einkaufen
  • erkaufen
  • freikaufen
  • Kauffrau
  • Kaufhaus
  • loskaufen

Usage notes

Die Katze im Sack kaufen (“to buy the cat in the sack”) is to buy something without examining it, like English “to buy a pig in a poke”.[1] Dafür kann ich mir nichts kaufen means “that is no use to me”.[11]

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 Kluge, Friedrich; Seebold, Elmar (2011), Etymologisches Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache, 25th ed., Berlin / Boston: De Gruyter, p. 483
  3. ^ 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
  4. ^ a b Lloyd, Albert L.; Springer, Otto; Lühr, Rosemarie, et al. (1988–), Etymologisches Wörterbuch des Althochdeutschen, Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht; online ewa.saw-leipzig.de, p. 5, 727
  5. ^ a b c Duden. Das Herkunftswörterbuch: Etymologie der deutschen Sprache (2020), 6th ed., Duden vol. 7, Berlin: Dudenverlag, p. 427
  6. ^ a b c Köbler, Gerhard (2014), Althochdeutsches Wörterbuch, 6th ed., online, koeblergerhard.de/wikiling
  7. ^ Schützeichel, Rudolf (2012), Althochdeutsches Wörterbuch, 7th ed., Berlin / Boston: De Gruyter, p. 181
  8. ^ Lloyd, Albert L.; Springer, Otto; Lühr, Rosemarie, et al. (1988–), Etymologisches Wörterbuch des Althochdeutschen, Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht; online ewa.saw-leipzig.de, p. 5, 724
  9. ^ Adelung, Johann Christoph (1793–1801), Grammatisch-kritisches Wörterbuch der Hochdeutschen Mundart, 2nd ed., 4 vols., Leipzig: Breitkopf
  10. ^ Anderson, Robert R.; Goebel, Ulrich; Reichmann, Oskar, eds. (1989–), Frühneuhochdeutsches Wörterbuch, Berlin / New York: De Gruyter; FWB-online, fwb-online.de
  11. ^ a b c d e f Duden. Das große Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache in zehn Bänden (1999), 3rd ed., Mannheim: Dudenverlag
  12. ^ Wiktionary, das freie Wörterbuch (German Wiktionary), de.wiktionary.org