Beautiful German words not for Anki

[Saim]

Sorry for hijacking this thread with the philosophy of linguistics, I didn't think my throw-away comment about how English and German are closer to each other than you might think would provoke this much discussion.

the conventional definition of what a word is.

a single distinct meaningful element of speech or writing, used with others (or sometimes alone) to form a sentence and shown with a space on either side when written or printed.

Writing or printing are irrelevant here.

Says you. And yet, here we are writing and not speaking.

Not just hashimi. Generally linguists do not consider writing to be an inherent part of language. Grammar is posterior to writing so I'm not sure how grammatical categories can be defined according to orthographic criteria, unless we're specifically talking about the grammar of the written language as a distinct code.

Yet we understand that in English it is 4 words and in German it is a single word.
Because that is the conventional definition of what a word is.

a single distinct meaningful element of speech or writing, used with others (or sometimes alone) to form a sentence and shown with a space on either side when written or printed.

Compound word are... made up of 2 or more words. Even the definition of compound words reinforces what a word is.
Compound noun can be written either as a single word, as a word with a hyphen, or as two words.

Armbanduhr is not three words. Armbanduhr mit Wecker is three words.
Handschuh is not two words.
Umwelteinflüssen is not four words.

Who made these definitions?

[Mista]

There is, however, some doubt whether you can say that a compound word is actually composed of words, some linguists would claim that the components are word stems rather than words.

A stem is just a technical term for a word.

Maybe in English. Certainly not in German or Norwegian. A word is in a shape that can occur freely in a sentence according to syntactic criteria. A stem needs a morphological addition. Ask any Norwegian on the street whether kongs is a word or not, and they will tell you that you can't use it as a word, but you can use it as the beginning of some words. No need to be a linguist to make that distinction, I promise.

[Kat]

These are three or four words, not one.

Maybe in English, in German it's one.

I don't know of any meaningful definition of "word" that would count "raspberry jam trade ship" as being a different number of words to "Himbeermarmeladenhandelsschiff".

Maybe in English. Certainly not in German or Norwegian. ... Ask any Norwegian on the street whether kongs is a word or not, and they will tell you that you can't use it as a word, but you can use it as the beginning of some words.

I think Mista is on the right track here. However you see this in English, you will have a very hard time to find a native German speaker who considers "Himbeermarmeladenschiff" anything but one single (albeit somewhat unusual ) word.

Yes, it is a compound but that doesn't change the fact that it's treated as one conceptual and grammatical unit. The different parts cannot stand on their own, not exactly in the form they take within the compound.

It's interesting that the two people who argue against this don't even seem to speak German, unless they have simply not listed it among their languages.

[patrickwilken]

However you see this in English, you will have a very hard time to find a native German speaker who considers "Himbeermarmeladenschiff" anything but one single (albeit somewhat unusual ) word.

A Himbeermarmeladenschiff is of course quite different from Himbeermarmeladenhandelsschiff!

Just so everyone is clear, Klinkerkluk, the stuffed-toy dragon companion to the pirate Lucy, was hungry and was hoping to find a Himbeermarmeladenhandelsschiff to rob, as raspberry jam is the only thing he eats.

I just found it somehow beautiful how German can so easily create a concept like this, and it feels very different (for me at least) than how it would sound if it was spelt out in several words. But maybe that's just me.

[Kat]

A Himbeermarmeladenschiff is of course quite different from Himbeermarmeladenhandelsschiff!

Oops, sorry for mangling you favorite word!

And, in an effort to go take this back to the original topic, two others I like:

There's a children's booked called "Die kleine Raupe Nimmersatt". While this doesn't really fit your criteria (Nimmersatt can be found in the Duden, so I guess you could put it into Anki), I've always loved this word. The English title in the bilingual version is "The very hungry caterpillar" but to me Nimmersatt (someone who is so greedy for food that they can't get enough, no matter how much they eat) is even more descriptive.

And the Traumzauberbaum stories I mentioned earlier in this thread are full of these words. One song is called "Mondsilbertaufe". Here's the original children's version with lyrics and here a piano variation that makes me wish I could play it). It's about a little fish that doesn't have the same beautiful shiny scales as the others. The moon feels sorry for it and casts its silvery light into the water, so the little fish can happily swim in the moonlight where it sparkles just as much as the others.

[Saim]

It's interesting that the two people who argue against this don't even seem to speak German, unless they have simply not listed it among their languages.

I do speak some German, it's just a relatively recent addition and I haven't changed my profile here in a while.

I'm not aware of ever having argued that Himbeermarmeladenschiff isn't a single word. What I'm saying is that raspberry jam trade ship is also one word (or, to get more technical, a single lexeme) despite the spaces.

[Kat]

I'm not aware of ever having argued that Himbeermarmeladenschiff isn't a single word. What I'm saying is that raspberry jam trade ship is also one word (or, to get more technical, a single lexeme) despite the spaces.

I had asked earlier in the thread because I wasn't sure what you had meant. Sorry for the misunderstanding and thanks for clarifying.

[Saim]

All good!

[patrickwilken]

I've always loved this word. The English title in the bilingual version is "The very hungry caterpillar" but to me Nimmersatt (someone who is so greedy for food that they can't get enough, no matter how much they eat) is even more descriptive.

I like "Nimmersatt" also. I guess I would translate it as "never satisfied", but that's not quite right.

Talking of children's words I like Kuscheltier (lit. cuddle-animal = stuffed toy). My wife was embarrassed to tell me at lunch she used to listen to "Kuschelrock" as a teenager which I guess was something like cuddly love rock music.

[Mista]

I'm not aware of ever having argued that Himbeermarmeladenschiff isn't a single word. What I'm saying is that raspberry jam trade ship is also one word (or, to get more technical, a single lexeme) despite the spaces.

I'm with you on that. Of course, you can define a word as anything between spaces, but that doesn't mean you should.

Getting back to the original topic, I found a nice little compound (in Norwegian) in Expugnator's log:

Norwegian

It doesn't surprise me that he doesn't know the word snikøre, because you'll never find it in a dictionary, and not in many other places either - if any. It means "sneaky ear", and in this context, it refers to someone who is eavesdropping while pretending to be asleep.