sterben

Forms

sterben (class 3 strong, third-person singular present stirbt, past tense starb, past participle gestorben, past subjunctive stürbe, auxiliary sein)^[1] The old plural preterite sturben (beside singular starb) was still usual in the 17th century and is found until the end of the 18th.^[2][3] Starben, formed after the singular, appears in the 16th century and won out in the 19th.^[2] A weak transitive sterben “to kill” (sterbte, gesterbt) survived in writing into the 18th century and later only in dialects.^[4]

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle High German sterben, inherited from Old High German sterban, inherited from Proto-West Germanic *sterban, inherited from Proto-Germanic *sterbaną, a strong verb found only in West Germanic.^[5][6][1] The same verb is Old Saxon sterƀan, Old Frisian sterva, Old English steorfan and Dutch sterven;^[5][6][2] English starve narrowed it to dying of hunger or cold.^[5][6][2]

An older meaning appears in Old Norse stjarfi (“tetanus, lockjaw”) and starfa (“to toil”), so the starting point was probably “to become stiff”, a veiled way of speaking of death.^[5][6][7] Kluge and Pfeifer compare Russian стербнуть (stérbnutʹ, “to harden, go numb”) and perhaps Ancient Greek στέρφος (stérphos, “hide, skin”), and forms without the initial /s/: Latin torpeō (“to be stiff, numb”) and Lithuanian tir̃pti (“to go numb”).^[5][6] Pfeifer traces them all to Proto-Indo-European *(s)terbʰ- or *(s)terp-, an extension of the root of starren “to be stiff”.^[6][7] Wiktionary gives both roots as alternatives, and Kluge calls a link with starr possible.^[1][5]

Earliest recorded meaning

Old High German sterban appears in the Tatian (about 830), then in Otfrid, Notker and the Physiologus, meaning “to die”; the prefixed irsterban is older, in the Abrogans glossary.^[8][9][10] Kluge dates the verb to the 9th century.^[5]

Semantic evolution

Since Old High German the verb has meant passing from life to death, of people and animals; in Middle High German it could also mean that property “fell free” by its owner's death.^[2][11][10] Konrad von Megenberg already used it of plants, though today eingehen is preferred for plants and verenden for animals.^[2] The noun Sterben meant above all an epidemic, the plague, in Middle High and Early New High German.^[12][13]

The phrase kein sterbendes Wörtchen (18th century, “a faint little word”) was contracted in the 19th century to kein Sterbenswörtchen, “not a word”.^[7] Prefixed and particle verbs such as absterben (16th century, of plants and limbs), aussterben (late Middle High German, of families and species) and versterben (only of people) divide the field further.^[7]

Timeline

• c. 830 – sterban is used in the Old High German Tatian.^[8]
• 9th century – Kluge's date for the verb's first record.^[5]
• 16th century – the plural preterite starben appears beside sturben;^[2][7] absterben is first recorded.^[2][7]
• 18th century – the phrase kein sterbendes Wörtchen is in use.^[7]
• 19th century – starben prevails, and Sterbenswörtchen is formed.^[2][7]

Meanings

Verb

1. To die, stop living: Ihr Großvater starb mit 91 Jahren.^[14][1]
2. To die a particular death, with an accusative: einen qualvollen Tod sterben.^[14][1]
3. To give one's life for someone or something: für seine Überzeugung sterben.^[14]
4. (colloquial) gestorben sein: of a plan, to have been dropped;^[14] für jemanden gestorben sein, to be ignored by someone completely.^[14]

Word family

• sterblich
• Sterben
• absterben
• aussterben
• ersterben
• versterben
• sterbenskrank
• Sterbenswörtchen

Related words

• starren
• starr
• English starve

Usage notes

Zum Sterben langweilig or müde is an emotional intensifier, “bored or tired to death”.^[14] In film jargon gestorben! means that a scene has been shot.^[14]

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 i Paul, Hermann (2002), Deutsches Wörterbuch: Bedeutungsgeschichte und Aufbau unseres Wortschatzes, 10th ed., ed. Helmut Henne, Heidrun Kämper and Georg Objartel, Tübingen: Niemeyer
3. ^ Grimm, Jacob; Grimm, Wilhelm (1854–1961), Deutsches Wörterbuch, 16 vols. in 32, Leipzig: Hirzel; digital: Wörterbuchnetz, Trier Center for Digital Humanities, p. 18, 2416
4. ^ Grimm, Jacob; Grimm, Wilhelm (1854–1961), Deutsches Wörterbuch, 16 vols. in 32, Leipzig: Hirzel; digital: Wörterbuchnetz, Trier Center for Digital Humanities, p. 18, 2430
5. ^ 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. 882
6. ^ a b c d e f Pfeifer, Wolfgang, et al. (1993), Etymologisches Wörterbuch des Deutschen, 2nd ed., Berlin: Akademie-Verlag; digital revised version in the DWDS, dwds.de
7. ^ a b c d e f g h Duden. Das Herkunftswörterbuch: Etymologie der deutschen Sprache (2020), 6th ed., Duden vol. 7, Berlin: Dudenverlag, p. 821
8. ^ a b Köbler, Gerhard (2014), Althochdeutsches Wörterbuch, 6th ed., online, koeblergerhard.de/wikiling
9. ^ Schützeichel, Rudolf (2012), Althochdeutsches Wörterbuch, 7th ed., Berlin / Boston: De Gruyter, p. 313
10. ^ 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, 1047
11. ^ Lexer, Matthias (1872–1878), Mittelhochdeutsches Handwörterbuch, 3 vols., Leipzig: Hirzel; digital: Wörterbuchnetz, Trier Center for Digital Humanities, p. 2, 1178
12. ^ Grimm, Jacob; Grimm, Wilhelm (1854–1961), Deutsches Wörterbuch, 16 vols. in 32, Leipzig: Hirzel; digital: Wörterbuchnetz, Trier Center for Digital Humanities, p. 18, 2431
13. ^ Anderson, Robert R.; Goebel, Ulrich; Reichmann, Oskar, eds. (1989–), Frühneuhochdeutsches Wörterbuch, Berlin / New York: De Gruyter; FWB-online, fwb-online.de
14. ^ a b c d e f g Duden. Das große Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache in zehn Bänden (1999), 3rd ed., Mannheim: Dudenverlag