nur

Forms

nur (adverb, particle and conjunction; not inflected)^[1][2] Early New High German had many variants: nuer, nuwer, newer, neur, nurt.^[3][4] The spelling nuhr (1557) still shows the long vowel.^[4][5]

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle High German nūr, a Central German form, contracted from older newære, inherited from Old High German niwāri, literally “it were not”.^[3][6][1] The Old High German phrase joins the negative particle ni to wāri, the past subjunctive of sīn (“to be”), and meant “unless, except”, attached at first mostly to a negative main clause.^[6][7][3] The present-tense phrase ni sī was formed in the same way and survives without its negation in ⟨es sei denn⟩ “unless”.^[6][5]

The phrase was fused and shortened step by step: in the 12th century to niwâr, in the 13th, with the stress moved to the negation, to niwer and nüwer, and then, as /iw/ and /uw/ merged into a single vowel, to niur (Bavarian ⟨neur⟩), ⟨nûer⟩ and Central German ⟨nûr⟩.^[5] Pfeifer dates the first ⟨nūr⟩ to the beginning of the 14th century; this Central German form is the one the standard language took over.^[6][5]

The other West Germanic languages shortened the same phrase: Old English ne wǣre became nǣre, Old Frisian ne wēre became nēre, and Middle Dutch newaer, after losing its negation, became Dutch maar (“but”).^[6][5][1] Old Saxon ni wāri was instead replaced by Middle Low German man (“only”), from newan.^[6] The same word is Yiddish נאָר (nor).^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

In Old High German and early Middle High German the phrase meant “unless, except”, as a condition attached to a negative clause.^[6][4] Köbler records the conjunction newære “unless” in Williram of Ebersberg's commentary on the Song of Songs (1060–1065).^[8] An early printed Bible still uses this sense in Genesis 32:26: ich lasse dich nit, nur du gesegnest mich (“I will not let you go unless you bless me”), where Luther wrote du segenest mich denn.^[4]

Semantic evolution

The sense “nothing but, no more than” is already Middle High German; it too stood at first after a negation, which was gradually dropped, so that ich war nur einmal bei ihm “I was there only once” goes back to a sentence of the type “I was not there, except once”.^[4] From late Middle High German on nur pushed back the older word for “only”, niwan.^[4] Weakened in meaning, it became a modal particle that gives force to requests, questions and wishes (nur Mut! “courage!”).^[6][2]

As a conjunction it adds a restriction to the preceding clause (“only, however”); subordinating nur daß “except that” has been in use since the 15th century, and the paired conjunction nicht nur … sondern auch “not only … but also” since the 16th.^[6] In the 16th to 18th centuries nur was also used in the temporal sense of nun, “just now”, as in Rädlein's er ist nur weg gegangen “he has only just left”.^[9]

Timeline

• 1060–1065 – The conjunction newære “unless” in Williram of Ebersberg.^[8]
• 12th century – The fused form is shortened to niwâr, newâr.^[5]
• 13th century – Forms with the stress on the first syllable: niwer, newer, nüwer.^[5]
• Early 14th century – First record of Central German nūr.^[6]
• 15th century – Subordinating nur daß “except that”.^[6]
• 1482 – nur in the Vocabularius Teutonico-Latinus.^[4]
• 16th century – nicht nur … sondern auch “not only … but also”.^[6]

Meanings

Adverb

1. only, merely: nothing more than what is named.^[2][1]
2. No more than a stated amount: ich brauche nur zwei Minuten “I only need two minutes”.^[2]
3. Exclusively, nothing other than: nur der Fachmann kann das beurteilen “only the expert can judge that”.^[2]

Conjunction

1. (chiefly colloquial) but, however: restricts what the preceding clause says.^[2][1]

Particle

1. Gives emphasis to a question, statement, request or wish: was hat sie sich dabei nur gedacht? “whatever was she thinking?”^[2]
2. ever, at all, in relative clauses: die Kinder bekommen alles, was sie nur wollen “the children get whatever they want”.^[2][1]
3. Reassures or encourages in statements and commands: geh nur zu ihm “just go to him”.^[2]

Word family

• nurmehr

Related words

• nun
• sein
• Dutch maar

Usage notes

In south-eastern German nur mehr is used where other regions say nur noch “only … still, no more than”.^[4][2]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Duden. Das große Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache in zehn Bänden (1999), 3rd ed., Mannheim: Dudenverlag
3. ^ a b c Kluge, Friedrich; Seebold, Elmar (2011), Etymologisches Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache, 25th ed., Berlin / Boston: De Gruyter, p. 661
4. ^ a b c d e f g h Paul, Hermann (2002), Deutsches Wörterbuch: Bedeutungsgeschichte und Aufbau unseres Wortschatzes, 10th ed., ed. Helmut Henne, Heidrun Kämper and Georg Objartel, Tübingen: Niemeyer
5. ^ a b c d e f g Grimm, Jacob; Grimm, Wilhelm (1854–1961), Deutsches Wörterbuch, 16 vols. in 32, Leipzig: Hirzel; digital: Wörterbuchnetz, Trier Center for Digital Humanities, p. 13, 998
6. ^ 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
7. ^ Duden. Das Herkunftswörterbuch: Etymologie der deutschen Sprache (2020), 6th ed., Duden vol. 7, Berlin: Dudenverlag
8. ^ a b Köbler, Gerhard (2014), Mittelhochdeutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., online, koeblergerhard.de/wikiling
9. ^ Grimm, Jacob; Grimm, Wilhelm (1854–1961), Deutsches Wörterbuch, 16 vols. in 32, Leipzig: Hirzel; digital: Wörterbuchnetz, Trier Center for Digital Humanities, p. 13, 1008