Etymologically
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laut

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Pronunciation

Forms

laut (strong nominative masculine singular lauter, comparative lauter, superlative am lautesten)[1] As a preposition it is invariable and takes the genitive, sometimes the dative under the influence of nach.[2]

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle High German lūt, inherited from Old High German lūt, also hlūt and chlūd, inherited from Proto-West Germanic *hlūd (“loud”).[3][1][4] The same adjective is Old English hlūd, Old Frisian hlūd and Old Saxon hlūd, and today Dutch luid and English loud.[3][5][6] Kroonen sets it up for Proto-Germanic as *hlūda-, but the Grimms' dictionary notes that it is missing in Gothic and Old Norse.[6][7]

It is a participle with the suffix *-to- of the root Proto-Indo-European *ḱleuə- (“to hear”), and so first meant “heard, audible”.[3][8][9] The same participle from the simpler root is Sanskrit श्रुत (śrutá, “heard, famous”), Ancient Greek κλυτός (klutós, “famous”) and Latin inclutus (“famous”), where the sense has become “renowned”.[3][5][8] Pfeifer stresses that the Germanic word has a different ablaut grade, and Kroonen that its long /ū/ arose within Germanic, perhaps in a form meaning “hearable”.[5][6] Leumund and perhaps lauschen belong to the same root.[8][3]

The preposition comes from the noun Laut (“sound; wording”), the abstract noun of the adjective, in formulas such as Middle High German nāch lūte (“according to the wording”) followed by the text or author in the genitive.[3][2][8][1] Wiktionary's German edition instead derives it from the verb lauten.[10]

Earliest recorded meaning

Old High German hlūt appears in the 8th century, in the Hildebrandslied, and then in Isidor, Otfrid, Notker and the glosses, meaning “loud, audible, resounding” and also “known”.[3][11][4] Isidor writes that the people chihôrdon gotes stimna hlûda in Sînaberge “heard God's voice loud on Mount Sinai”.[7]

Semantic evolution

Usually laut refers to a strong sound, the opposite of leise, but it can also mean just “audible”, the opposite of still, as in laut denken; from there it came to mean “known, public”, as in Luther's da nun das Gebot … laut ward and Schiller.[2] Middle High German lūt could also describe what is bright and clear to the eye.[5] The old adverb, Old High German hlūto, still appears as laute in the 17th century, and the rare umlauted comparative läuter occurs in Konrad von Megenberg.[7]

The noun Laut first named anything heard, then the content of a document read aloud (as still in Wortlaut); from nāch lūte “according to the wording” the preposition laut arose in the 15th century, now “according to” any source.[2][8][3] Kluge compares the modern Originalton X.[3] In hunting a dog gibt Laut when it barks to signal game, and vorlaut, said in the 16th century of a hound that gives tongue too early, was applied to forward children in the 18th.[2][5] Esperanto took both laŭta “loud” and laŭ “according to” from German.[1]

Timeline

  • 8th century – Old High German hlūt in the Hildebrandslied and glosses.[3][11]
  • 10th century – The abstract noun, Old High German hlūtī, lūtīn.[3]
  • 15th century – The preposition laut “according to” from nāch lūte.[2]
  • 16th century – vorlaut of a hound giving tongue too early.[5]
  • 18th century – Laut becomes a term of linguistics, “speech sound”.[5]
  • 1822 – Jacob Grimm coins Lautverschiebung “sound shift”.[5]

Meanings

Adjective

  1. Loud, clearly audible: ein lauter Knall;[9][1] laut lesen.[9][1]
  2. Noisy, full of noise: ein lautes Viertel.[9][1]
  3. Of colours or advertising: garish, loud.[9]
  4. In laut werden: to become known, be voiced: Kritik wurde laut.[9][2]

Preposition

  1. According to, as stated in: laut Fahrplan;[1][10][2] laut Polizei.[1][10][2]

Word family

  • lauten
  • läuten
  • Laut
  • vorlaut
  • kleinlaut
  • verlautbaren
  • Wortlaut
  • Leumund
  • lauschen
  • English loud

Usage notes

Laut denken is to think aloud, to talk to oneself; it is also used of floating an idea in public.[9] With the preposition, a noun without an article often stays uninflected (laut Vertrag), and Goethe uses the dative (laut dem Vorbericht).[2]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Paul, Hermann (2002), Deutsches Wörterbuch: Bedeutungsgeschichte und Aufbau unseres Wortschatzes, 10th ed., ed. Helmut Henne, Heidrun Kämper and Georg Objartel, Tübingen: Niemeyer
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Kluge, Friedrich; Seebold, Elmar (2011), Etymologisches Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache, 25th ed., Berlin / Boston: De Gruyter, p. 563
  4. ^ a b Schützeichel, Rudolf (2012), Althochdeutsches Wörterbuch, 7th ed., Berlin / Boston: De Gruyter, p. 210
  5. ^ 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
  6. ^ a b c Kroonen, Guus (2013), Etymological Dictionary of Proto-Germanic, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 11, Leiden / Boston: Brill
  7. ^ 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. 12, 366
  8. ^ a b c d e Duden. Das Herkunftswörterbuch: Etymologie der deutschen Sprache (2020), 6th ed., Duden vol. 7, Berlin: Dudenverlag
  9. ^ a b c d e f g Duden. Das große Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache in zehn Bänden (1999), 3rd ed., Mannheim: Dudenverlag
  10. ^ a b c Wiktionary, das freie Wörterbuch (German Wiktionary), de.wiktionary.org
  11. ^ a b Köbler, Gerhard (2014), Althochdeutsches Wörterbuch, 6th ed., online, koeblergerhard.de/wikiling