German language dictionary
The
Deutsches Worterbuch
(
German:
[?d??t??s
?vœ?t?buːx]
; "The German Dictionary"), abbreviated
DWB
, is the largest and most comprehensive
dictionary
of the
German language
in existence.
[1]
[2]
Encompassing modern
High German
vocabulary in use since 1450, it also includes
loanwords
adopted from other languages into German. Entries cover the
etymology
,
meanings
,
attested forms
,
synonyms
, usage peculiarities, and regional differences of words found throughout the
German speaking world
. The dictionary's
historical linguistics
approach, illuminated by examples from
primary source
documents, makes it to German what the
Oxford English Dictionary
is to
English
.
[3]
The first completed DWB lists over 330,000
headwords
in 67,000 print columns spanning 32 volumes.
[4]
The
Deutsches Worterbuch
was begun by the
Brothers Grimm
in 1838 and the initial volumes were published in 1854. Unfinished at the time of their deaths, the dictionary was finally completed by a succession of later scholars and institutions in 1961.
[1]
In 1971, a 33rd supplement volume was published containing 25,000 additional entries. New research projects began in 2004 to expand and update the oldest parts of the dictionary to modern academic standards. Volumes A?F were planned for completion in 2012 by the Language Research Centre at the
Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and Humanities
[4]
and the
University of Gottingen
.
[2]
History
[
edit
]
Beginnings
[
edit
]
Beginning in 1830,
Weidmann's Publishing House
in
Leipzig
repeatedly approached
Jacob
and
Wilhelm Grimm
with a proposal for a large new dictionary, spanning
German
vocabulary from
Martin Luther
to
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
. As busy professors at
Gottingen University
, the
Brothers Grimm
rejected such a complex undertaking. A political scandal then dramatically changed matters. In 1837, the new King of Hanover,
Ernst August
, dissolved parliament and demanded oaths of allegiance from all civil servants. The brothers and five other professors refused and this so-called "
Gottingen Seven
" were removed from their positions by royal order. The brothers then became political refugees in their former home in
Kassel
.
[5]
The Grimms (1838?1863)
[
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]
By October 1838, the Brothers had a contract with Weidmann's and the prestigious Leipzig journal
Allgemeine Zeitung
published an announcement of the start of work on the DWB. The brothers initially expected the project to take ten years and produce 6?7 volumes. Circumstances seemed favorable because they were provided with staff and spacious apartments in
Berlin
at the invitation of the Prussian Minister in 1841. However, difficulties soon began. Not only did the acquisition of source excerpts take much longer than expected, but illness and the
Revolution of 1848
interrupted the work. Eight volumes consisting of 1824 printed columns, a bibliography and a detailed preface were finally published on 13 April 1854.
[6]
The first edition of the
DWB
exceeded the expectations of the brothers and the publishers. The press called it a "great national work" and its first shipments sold 10,000 copies. As it included words regarded as "indelicate," Jacob anticipated criticism of this and stated the following in the Foreword:
- "This dictionary is not an immoral book, but a scientific undertaking. Even the
Bible
does not lack for words that are frowned upon in fine society."
- -
Jacob Grimm
,
Vorwort 1. Band, S. XXXIV
, Leipzig 1854
More volumes and updates were planned, but in their lifetime the brothers could only fully complete portions: Wilhelm Grimm wrote the articles to the letter D and died in 1859; Jacob, who was able to fully complete the letters A, B, C and E, died in 1863 while working on the entry for "Frucht" (fruit).
[7]
Post-Grimm era (1863?1907)
[
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]
After the deaths of the Grimm Brothers, successive linguists continued the work. The first of these were close associates of the brothers,
Rudolf Hildebrand
and
Karl Weigand
. The
DWB
also became an affair of state when
Otto von Bismarck
requested the
North German Confederation
Federal Council to provide state funding in 1867. The young
Germanist
Moritz Heyne
joined the project and became one of its most important contributors. By 1888 Heyne had invited graduate students to post articles under his supervision, turning the DWB into a true consortium for the first time. Included in this group was Rudolf Meißner who collaborated on the
DWB
for six decades (1889?1948). These ever-changing authors had different approaches and the work also proceeded very slowly. Hermann Wunderlich, Hildebrand's successor, only finished
Gestume
to
Gezwang
after 20 years of work and 3000 columns of text. By 1905, academic professionals across Germany were unanimous: management of the DWB had to change or it would never be completed.
[6]
Academy of Sciences (1908?1961)
[
edit
]
The prestigious
Prussian Academy of Sciences
took on formal development of the
DWB
in 1908 with
Gottingen
remaining a central collection point for
source documents
. Operations were streamlined and salaried workers were provided through funding by the Empire. This period of reform and consolidation ended with
World War I
in 1914. By the early '20s the project was again close to collapse as
German hyperinflation
drove costs of production to over 5 billion marks. A donation of just $152 from the United States in 1923 saved the
DWB
from ruin.
Max Planck
repeatedly advocated for the dictionary and funding was eventually taken up by the
Emergency Association of German Science
. Due to the efficiencies of a permanent staff of lexicographers as well as standardized policies for production, the period between 1931?1939 saw six times as much work completed as in the previous years. Nearly 100 years after its conception the DWB was permanently institutionalized and its conclusion was in sight.
[6]
World War II
then paralyzed the work. Employees were drafted into military service, resources were scarce, and the archived holdings were moved to a
potash mine
at
Bernburg an der Saale
to protect them from
Allied bombing
. The remaining three employees continued some work at Schloss Fredersdorf outside Berlin. After the war the USSR granted permission to move the archived materials from Fredersdorf and Bernburg back to Berlin in 1947. The new
German Academy of Sciences at Berlin
then took on the work of the DWB. With the founding of
East Germany
in 1949, communication between Berlin and Gottingen became more difficult. Despite these political complications, the
DWB
was finally published in January 1961, 123 years after its beginnings. It totaled 67,744 text columns, 320,000 keywords and weighed 84 kg. A 1971 supplement contains 25,000 additional entries and references to primary sources.
[3]
Later versions
[
edit
]
Planning for a second edition had already begun in 1957, four years before the first edition was finished. The revision was intended especially to bring the oldest part of the
Dictionary
, the letters A-F originally authored by the
Brothers Grimm
, up to date. It also was to be a cooperative effort between
East
and
West Germany
: the
Academy of Sciences of the GDR
in
East Berlin
would complete A-C, and the
University of Gottingen
in the West would complete D-F. The initial fascicles of this revision were published in 1965, but it remains unfinished today, with the letters B and C (originally assigned to the Berlin team) still in progress. The East German Berlin team was greatly hindered for political reasons because the
SED
authorities saw the DWB as a "bourgeois" lexicography project. In the course of the 1960s, most of its staff were taken off the project and used for other tasks.
[8]
In 1984, the original 1961 version of the
DWB
was published in a paperback edition, now out of print. In 1999 a new paperback printing of all 33 volumes (weight 30 kg), published by Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag, became available (
ISBN
978-3423590457
).
Digital edition
[
edit
]
In 2004 the Competence Center for Electronic Text Processing and Publication in the Humanities at the
University of Trier
digitized the entire 300 million printed characters according to the method of double entry. The entire body was manually entered twice in China to eliminate error.
[9]
A set of CD-ROMs of this digitization was released for Microsoft Windows, Linux and Mac OS. In this version spelling errors in the original were corrected. An online version of the first edition is also available at the
University of Trier
.
[3]
The digitized first edition of the
DWB
met with lively interest. Every day the online version receives tens of thousands of hits and the CD-ROM of the first edition is now in its fourth updated distribution.
[10]
New edition
[
edit
]
In 2006 the unfinished project to revise and update the A-F volumes to modern academic standards was resumed. The conclusion of this work (the B and C volumes) was finished in 2016;
[11]
fascicles are appearing with the S. Hirzel Verlag
[12]
as they are completed.
However, the
Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and Humanities
[13]
announced that no revision of the volumes G to Z is planned. According to the Academic Director of the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy, Wolf-Hagen Krauth, the sheer labor that would be required exceeds the possibilities for funding it in today's world.
[14]
See also
[
edit
]
- Die Bruder Grimm: Pioniere deutscher Sprachkultur des 21. Jahrhunderts
. Herausgegeben von Jochen Bar ... [et al.]; [Texte und Redaktion: Bernhard Roll, Andrea Rocha-Lieder].
ISBN
9783577003056
References
[
edit
]
- ^
a
b
Synopsis of the
Deutsches Worterbuch
Archived
2016-08-12 at the
Wayback Machine
(in English)
at the Language Research Centre, Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and Humanities, retrieved 27 June 2012.
- ^
a
b
Clifford Wunderlich:
Deutsches Worterbuch von Jacob und Wilhelm Grimm
Archived
2014-07-02 at
archive.today
, Andover-Harvard Theological Library, Harvard University Divinity School, April 2012.
(in English)
retrieved 27 June 2012.
- ^
a
b
c
Thomas Schares:
Untersuchungen zu Anzahl, Umfang und Struktur der Artikel der Erstbearbeitung des Deutschen Worterbuchs von Jacob Grimm und Wilhelm Grimm
, Trier: Universitat Trier, 2006, p. 41-42
Abstract in English
Full article in German
, retrieved 27 June 2012.
- ^
a
b
Das DWB
Archived
2012-07-12 at the
Wayback Machine
at the Deutsches Worterbuch research project website
(in German)
, retrieved 27 June 2012.
- ^
Jack Zipes:
The Oxford Companion to Fairy Tales.
Oxford University Press.
ISBN
978-0-19-860115-9
. pp. 218?219
- ^
a
b
c
"150 Jahre Deutsches Worterbuch der Bruder Grimm"
. 150-grimm.bbaw.de
. Retrieved
2015-08-16
.
- ^
[1]
Archived
October 1, 2010, at the
Wayback Machine
- ^
"150 Jahre Deutsches Worterbuch der Bruder Grimm"
. 150-grimm.bbaw.de
. Retrieved
2015-08-16
.
- ^
"China sei Dank: Grimm-Worterbuch auch digital verfugbar"
.
Der Standard
. 10 August 2004
. Retrieved
12 January
2019
.
- ^
[2]
Archived
April 28, 2012, at the
Wayback Machine
- ^
"Deutsches Worterbuch von Jacob Grimm und Wilhelm Grimm"
. Gottingen Academy of Sciences and Humanities. Archived from
the original
on 2017-08-28
. Retrieved
2018-11-04
.
- ^
"Hirzel: Bruder Grimm"
. Hirzel.de
. Retrieved
2015-08-16
.
- ^
"Project Type ? Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and Humanities"
. Bbaw.de. Archived from
the original
on 2018-09-30
. Retrieved
2015-08-16
.
- ^
Heine, Matthias (2011-11-23).
"Deutsches Denkmal: Es war einmal das Worterbuch der Grimms - DIE WELT"
.
Die Welt
. Welt.de
. Retrieved
2015-08-16
.
External links
[
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]