19 German Compound Words with Surprising Translations: Mammutwörter and the Longest German, English and Welsh Words – prepare yourself to be amazed.
For many of us, myself included, learning German is like climbing the Himalayas Mountains. If the grammar or the articles don’t get to you, the compound words without exact translation into English will – because in some German compound words the stem words don’t keep their meaning. The beauty of it is that once you do learn their meaning you grasp their beauty.
Dreikäsehoch
Literally: Three + cheese + high
Meaning: the loving nickname you would give a small child who is only as tall as three wheels of cheese stacked on top of each other.
Precious! Reminds me of Heidi!
Eselsbrücke
Literally: donkey bridge
Meaning: a mnemonic device, a memory aide
Flak
Flak is an acronym for a pre – World War 2 anti-aircraft gun: Fliegerabwehrkanone
Fliegerabwehr means “defense against air attack” and Kanone means cannon.
Fernweh
Literally: Distance + pain
Meaning: It describes the feeling you get when you want to be somewhere else, a yearn for the freedom and adventure of travel. Similar to wanderlust (see below).
Handschuh
Literally: hand shoe
Meaning: glove
How very logical, right?
Handschuhschneeballwerfer
Literally: Glove + snowball + throwe
Meaning: a wimp.
If you ever tried to through more than one snowball without your gloves on you will not agree with this meaning. I second that.
Kindergarten
Literally: Children + garden
Friedrich Froebel, a 19th Century German educator, was one of the first to believe that children needed some formal education, through play and exploration, before primary school.
Froebel opened his first kindergarten in 1837, and the curriculum included playing with toys, playing games and singing songs. By the 1880s, kindergartens opened in Austria, Belgium, Canada, Germany, Great Britain, the Netherlands, Hungary, Japan, Switzerland, and the United States.
The word itself came into English in 1852—the same year that Froebel died.
Kopfkino
Literally: head cinema
Meaning: your vivid imagination
Kühlschrank
Literally: cool + cupboard
Meaning: refrigerator
To the point!
Meerschweinschen
Literally: Sea + little pig
Meaning: guinea pig
Nacktschnecke
Literally: literally: naked snail
Meaning:: slug
Ohrwurm
Literally: Ear + worm
Meaning: This describe that song stuck in your head, the one you are singing over and over again.
Schwarmerei
Not exactly a compound word, schwarmerei is derived from the German verb schwärmen, which means to swarm.
Schwarmerei refers to excessive and uninhibited enthusiasm and also puppy love.
Sturmfrei
Literally: Storm (tempest) + free
Meaning: When you have the house to yourself and everyone else is away
I wonder who they refer to as the “tempest” here…
Tagedieb
Literally: day + thief
Meaning: a dilly-dallier, a lay about, a loafer
Torschlusspanik
Literally: Gate + shut + panic
Meaning: The fear we get, as we age, that time is running out and important opportunities are slipping us away.
Tick-tock, says your biological clock.
Treppenwitz
Literally: Stairs (staircase) + joke
Meaning: The joke you came up with but the moment to share it has already passed.
Verschlimmbessern
Literally: Make something worse + to improve
Meaning: Making something worse by trying to improve it.
Sound like any home DIY to me…
Wanderlust
Literally: Migratory / travelling + desire / appetite
Meaning: An aching desire to travel and get away.
Desire to turn into a peripatetic, a walking wanderer.
Weltschmerz
Literally: World + pain/ grief
Meaning: A feeling of melancholy or pessimism, of having lost all faith in the world and humankind.
The word Weltschmerz was born during the Romantic literary movement of the 19th century. It was first used it to describe Lord Byron’s cynical loathing for the world.
Zugzwang
Literally: Pull / tug + force
Meaning: Forced to make a decision when under stress or pressure.
The longest German composed word stretches at 80 letters:
Donaudampfschifffahrtselektrizitätenhauptbetriebswerkbauunterbeamtengesellschaft
The “Association for Subordinate Officials of the Head Office Management of the Danube Steamboat Electrical Services”.
The longest English word in the Oxford Dictionary has 45 letters:
Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis
“an artificial long word said to mean a lung disease caused by inhaling very fine ash and sand dust.
The longest word to be found in Britain is a Welsh place name with 58 letters:
Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch
You might like to read: 20 Afrikaans words with interesting English literal translations
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Thank you for this nice list! Zugzwang is also found in the French dictionary, as a chess term.
Great pleasure and thank you for your valuable contribution! I learned something new today.
Thank you, Patricia for the wonderful list of special “feeling/emotion” words which we always feel, but are not able to blurt/explain at that very moment
Ah, thank you so very much for your kind words 🙂
I’ve experienced plenty of ‘fernweh’ during these past two years!