I love how the Germans use zeuge.
Tools? Those are work things. (Werkzeuge)
Airplanes? You know, flying things! (Flugzeuge)
Vehicles? Duh, the driving things! (Fahrzeuge)
Why make new word when two (or six) words will do?
this post was submitted on 07 Jan 2025
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compoundwords are marvelous <3
coumpoundwordsareamarvelouszeuge.
No, compound words are usually just compound nouns. Exactly the same as in English, except the space is missing.
English does that too sometimes, look at the "closed" compounds:
i really dont like that "compound word" is not a proper compoundword.
i hope my mispelling spreads far enough to remedy this.
Good point, Küchenentlüftungsschießeinrichtung
It's 3:30 AM and I'm giggling like an asshole
Swimsuit? Bath stuff (Badezeug)
Bedding? Bed stuff (Bettzeug)
Lighter? Fire stuff (Feuerzeug)
Drums? Strike stuff (Schlagzeug)
Toys? Play stuff (Spielzeug)
Bandages? Bind stuff (Verbandszeug)
To convince someone? Over-thing them. (überzeugen)
German here. That's an entirely different word, with a different word stem and history, despite being spelled exactly the same.
Also completely unrelated to Zeugen (witnesses) and zeugen (conceive).
Fascinating
Honestly, I love this language. And I fully understand anyone who hates it.
Like... Fire things, green things, bed things, playing things and hundreds of other things. Love it almost as much as animals that are just something-animal. Like bag-animal (marsupial), beak-animal (platypus) or belt-animal (armadillo).
An armadillo is just an Illo with a gun
I think it's fun how Zeug has gone from a technical meaning to a cute one.
The current meaning of Zeug is something like stuff or unimportant things.
It used to mean kit, gear or equipment though, which makes a lot of sense and is still visible in words like Zeugwart (equipment manager of a sports team or army).
With that knowledge, Werkzeug would just be a tool kit.
Same thing in Norwegian with "tøy" (verktøy, fly, kjøretøy, plus fartøy for water-faring vessels) … and then tøy by itself means cloth or clothes (also available through klestøy)
You can translate Zeug with thing.
Workthingy
Flythingy
Drivethingy
...
Witnesses? They're just ... things. (Zeugen)
the base noun is really "Zeug"
Someone break this word down for me and explain why it's so long 😡
Someone break this word down for me
Hilfe leistungs lösch gruppen fahrzeug
(technically i’d need to add capitalization and dashes when separating into full nouns)
help giving exterminating groups’ ~~vehicle~~ drive thing (as others in this thread have noted)
Das Hilfeleistungslöschgruppenfahrzeug der Feuerwehr […]
The aid-providing fire-fighting vehicle of the fire department
Es transportiert Feuerwehrleute, Leitern, Werkzeuge, Schläu[che…]
It transports firefighters, ladders, tools, hoses
Not gonna lie, it’s a bit over the top. Feuerwehrfahrzeug (fire dept’s truck) would’ve sufficed IMO. Nobody not working as a firefighter (and arguably not even all of those who do) knows let alone uses that long-form word.
"Feuerwehrfahrzeug" is still too many letters 😮💨