schlagen

Forms

schlagen (class 6 strong, third-person singular present schlägt, past tense schlug, past participle geschlagen, past subjunctive schlüge, auxiliary haben)^[1] The older infinitive was schlahen or schlahn, still usual in Early New High German and found in dialects today.^[2] Herder still rhymed schlahn in a poem after Simon Dach.^[2]

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle High German slahen, inherited from Old High German slahan, inherited from Proto-Germanic *slahaną (“to strike”).^[3][4][1] The same word is Gothic 𐍃𐌻𐌰𐌷𐌰𐌽 (slahan), Old Norse slá, Old English slēan, Old Frisian slā and Old Saxon slahan, continued in Dutch slaan, English slay and Swedish slå.^[3][5][6]

The /g/ of the modern verb is not original: Germanic had a grammatical alternation between /h/ in the present and /g/ in the plural of the past and the past participle (Old High German sluog, gislagan), and German generalised the /g/ to the whole verb.^[3][4][7] Gothic levelled the alternation the other way, in favour of /h/.^[8] The derivatives Schlacht, Geschlecht and ungeschlacht still show the old consonant.^[7]

Outside Germanic the verb has only weak comparisons.^[3] The best match is Celtic: Middle Irish slacc (“sword”) and slachta (“struck”), from which Pfeifer sets up a root Proto-Indo-European *slak- (“to strike, hammer”).^[4][3] Kroonen treats the verb as a Germanic–Celtic word, perhaps imitative in origin.^[5] Kluge also mentions, with reserve, a link with Ancient Greek κλάω (kláō, “I break”) and Ancient Greek κλάδος (kládos, “branch”), or with Latin calx (“heel”).^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

Old High German slahan appears from the 8th century in the Abrogans and other glosses, and then in Isidor, Tatian, Otfrid and Notker.^[9][10] Its senses there already range from “to strike, beat” to “to kill, slaughter” and “to forge (metal)”;^[9][11] slahan nāh meant “to take after someone”.^[9][11]

Semantic evolution

In the older language the verb often meant “to slay”, as in Luther's Bible, and also “to slaughter”;^[2] the idea of killing survives in zwei Fliegen mit einer Klappe schlagen “to kill two birds with one stone”.^[2] The striking of a weapon in battle gave the reflexive sich schlagen “to fight”.^[2] A special sense “to take a certain direction, take after someone” is old, seen in Geschlecht and in phrases such as aus der Art schlagen “to be unlike one's family”.^[7]

From the verb came the noun Schlag, with many special senses, among them “stroke” (the illness), a loan translation of Greek-Latin apoplexia.^[3] Schläger “one who strikes” is Middle High German;^[4] Pfeifer dates the sense “brawler” to the 17th century,^[4] Duden to the 18th, when it also became the name of the students' duelling sword.^[7] Schlager “hit song” arose in Vienna around 1880, probably after the image of a lightning strike.^[7] German Schlagsahne “whipped cream” was used in English in 1907, and Czech šlehat “to whip” is listed as a German loan.^[12]

Timeline

• 8th century – Old High German slahan is recorded in the glosses.^[3][10]
• 10th century – abaslahan “to cut off” and anaslahan are recorded.^[4]
• 15th century – Anschlag takes the sense “attempt on someone's life”, and abschlägig “refusing” appears.^[4]
• 16th century – den Ausschlag geben “to tip the balance” is recorded.^[4]
• 17th century – Schläger means “brawler”.^[4]
• Around 1880 – Schlager “hit” appears in Vienna.^[7]
• 1907 – Schlagsahne is recorded in English.^[12]

Meanings

Verb

1. To hit, beat, strike someone or something, also with a stick or tool;^[13][1] sie schlug mit der Hand auf das Pult.^[13][1]
2. (reflexive) To fight, come to blows;^[13][1] die Brüder schlagen sich schon wieder.^[13][1]
3. To drive in or fasten by blows: a nail into a wall, a post into the ground.^[13]
4. To fell trees.^[13]
5. (cooking) To whip, beat (cream, egg white).^[13][1]
6. To strike against something, hit hard, with sein: das Fenster schlug gegen die Wand.^[13]
7. Of the heart, a clock or a bird: to beat, chime, sing: die Uhr schlägt zwölf.^[13][1]
8. To play by striking (a drum, a harp); to beat (time).^[13]
9. To defeat, beat an army or an opponent.^[13][1]
10. (chess and board games) To capture a piece.^[13][1]
11. To add (a sum) to something: costs to the price.^[13]
12. To take after someone, with sein: der Kleine schlägt ganz nach seinem Großvater.^[13]
13. (hunting) Of a bird of prey: to seize and kill.^[13]

Word family

• Schlag
• Schläger
• Schlägerei
• Schlager
• Schlägel
• abschlägig
• abschlagen
• anschlagen
• aufschlagen
• ausschlagen
• beschlagen
• erschlagen
• verschlagen
• Schlagsahne
• Schlagwort
• schlagfertig

Related words

• Schlacht
• Geschlecht
• ungeschlacht
• Schlacke
• English slay

Usage notes

Zwei Fliegen mit einer Klappe schlagen is to achieve two things with one action.^[2] The perfect is formed with haben in most senses but with sein when the subject moves against something or takes after someone.^[13]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f 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 Kluge, Friedrich; Seebold, Elmar (2011), Etymologisches Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache, 25th ed., Berlin / Boston: De Gruyter, p. 807
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 Kroonen, Guus (2013), Etymological Dictionary of Proto-Germanic, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 11, Leiden / Boston: Brill
6. ^ Orel, Vladimir (2003), A Handbook of Germanic Etymology, Leiden / Boston: Brill
7. ^ a b c d e f Duden. Das Herkunftswörterbuch: Etymologie der deutschen Sprache (2020), 6th ed., Duden vol. 7, Berlin: Dudenverlag, p. 738
8. ^ Grimm, Jacob; Grimm, Wilhelm (1854–1961), Deutsches Wörterbuch, 16 vols. in 32, Leipzig: Hirzel; digital: Wörterbuchnetz, Trier Center for Digital Humanities, p. 15, 346
9. ^ a b c Lloyd, Albert L.; Springer, Otto; Lühr, Rosemarie, et al. (1988–), Etymologisches Wörterbuch des Althochdeutschen, Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht; online ewa.saw-leipzig.de, p. 8, 384
10. ^ a b Köbler, Gerhard (2014), Althochdeutsches Wörterbuch, 6th ed., online, koeblergerhard.de/wikiling
11. ^ a b Schützeichel, Rudolf (2012), Althochdeutsches Wörterbuch, 7th ed., Berlin / Boston: De Gruyter, p. 296
12. ^ a b Lehnwortportal Deutsch (2012–), Leibniz-Institut für Deutsche Sprache, Mannheim, lwp.ids-mannheim.de
13. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p Duden. Das große Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache in zehn Bänden (1999), 3rd ed., Mannheim: Dudenverlag