Etymologically
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sorgen

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Pronunciation

  • /ˈzɔrɡən/, [ˈzɔʁ-], [ˈzɔɐ̯-][1]

Forms

sorgen (third-person singular present sorgt, past tense sorgte, past participle gesorgt, auxiliary haben)[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle High German sorgen, inherited from Old High German sorgēn, inherited from Proto-Germanic *surgāną (“to worry”), a verb formed from the noun that is now Sorge.[2][1][3] The same verb is Gothic 𐍃𐌰𐌿𐍂𐌲𐌰𐌽 (saurgan), Old Norse syrgja, Old English sorgian, Old Saxon sorgon and Dutch zorgen, and English sorrow as a verb.[2][4] The noun is Proto-Germanic *surgō (“worry, grief”), in 𐍃𐌰𐌿𐍂𐌲𐌰 (saurga), sorg and sorh.[3][5]

Its further origin is uncertain.[2] Old High German also has forms with /sw-/ in the Tatian and Otfrid, which the EWA and Kroonen take as secondary.[6][5] If they are original, the word may be compared with Sanskrit सूर्क्षति (sū́rkṣati, “cares about”) and an Indo-European *swergʰ- (“to care for”).[2][7] If not, Pfeifer and the Duden compare Old Irish serg (“illness”) and Lithuanian sir̃gti (“to be ill”), from a sense “oppression of body or mind”.[2][8] Kluge compares Lithuanian sérgėti (“to guard, keep”) and, more distantly, Latin servō (“to keep, save”).[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

Old High German sorgēn is recorded from the 8th century, in the Muspilli, the Murbach hymns, the Tatian, Otfrid and Notker, meaning “to be anxious (about)”, “to take pains” and “to care for”.[2][9][7] Wulfila's Gothic saurgan translates Greek “to be grieved”.[4]

Semantic evolution

The verb once meant “to grieve, to feel sorrow”, as Adelung notes,[10] and the noun kept the sense “grief” in Low German, Swedish and English.[8] Middle High German sorgen meant “to be worried, troubled, afraid”.[11][12] By Adelung's time the sense of grief was old-fashioned, and the main uses were “to worry about a future evil” and für etwas sorgen “to see to something”; he also notes the sense “to fear” in familiar speech.[10] Goethe still uses it in this way: Oftmals hab' ich gesorgt, es möchte der Krug dir entstürzen (“often I feared the jug might fall from you”).[13]

In German the noun developed both “fear of a threat” and “effort to remove it”, and the verb followed the second branch in sorgen für and in its prefixed forms.[2] Today für etwas sorgen has also faded to “to cause”, as in Die Nachricht sorgte für Aufsehen.[13][1] The reflexive sich sorgen “to worry” is the usual form of the first sense.[13]

Timeline

  • 8th century – Old High German sorgēn is recorded.[2]
  • 9th century – Forms with sw- appear in the Tatian and Otfrid, and bisorgēn is recorded.[2][6]
  • Late Middle High German – besorgnis appears.[2]
  • Second half of the 20th century – entsorgen “to dispose of waste” is coined.[2]

Meanings

Verb

  1. (reflexive) To worry, to be concerned: Sie sorgt sich um ihren Sohn.[13][1]
  2. To look after, to care for (with für): Wer sorgt in den Ferien für die Katze?[13][1]
  3. To see to it that something is there or happens, to ensure (with für): Die Gastgeberin sorgte für gute Stimmung.[13][1]
  4. To bring about, to cause (with für): Der Sturm sorgte für Verspätungen.[13][1]

Word family

  • besorgen
  • entsorgen
  • versorgen
  • besorgt
  • Besorgnis
  • Sorge
  • English sorrow

Usage notes

The proverb Borgen macht Sorgen “borrowing brings worries” is recorded by Adelung.[10] Only the dialect of Carinthia has a strong participle.[4]

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 k Pfeifer, Wolfgang, et al. (1993), Etymologisches Wörterbuch des Deutschen, 2nd ed., Berlin: Akademie-Verlag; digital revised version in the DWDS, dwds.de
  3. ^ a b c Kluge, Friedrich; Seebold, Elmar (2011), Etymologisches Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache, 25th ed., Berlin / Boston: De Gruyter, p. 859
  4. ^ 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. 16, 1773
  5. ^ a b Kroonen, Guus (2013), Etymological Dictionary of Proto-Germanic, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 11, Leiden / Boston: Brill
  6. ^ 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. 8, 642
  7. ^ a b Köbler, Gerhard (2014), Althochdeutsches Wörterbuch, 6th ed., online, koeblergerhard.de/wikiling
  8. ^ a b Duden. Das Herkunftswörterbuch: Etymologie der deutschen Sprache (2007), 4th ed., Duden vol. 7, Mannheim: Dudenverlag
  9. ^ Schützeichel, Rudolf (2012), Althochdeutsches Wörterbuch, 7th ed., Berlin / Boston: De Gruyter, p. 327
  10. ^ a b c Adelung, Johann Christoph (1793–1801), Grammatisch-kritisches Wörterbuch der Hochdeutschen Mundart, 2nd ed., 4 vols., Leipzig: Breitkopf
  11. ^ Lexer, Matthias (1872–1878), Mittelhochdeutsches Handwörterbuch, 3 vols., Leipzig: Hirzel; digital: Wörterbuchnetz, Trier Center for Digital Humanities, p. 2, 1058
  12. ^ Köbler, Gerhard (2014), Mittelhochdeutsches Wörterbuch, 3rd ed., online, koeblergerhard.de/wikiling
  13. ^ a b c d e f g Duden. Das große Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache in zehn Bänden (1999), 3rd ed., Mannheim: Dudenverlag