geheuer und Ungeheuer
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Two years ago, I wrote a post about "kempt and sheveled" (3/26/23).
That elicited the following offline comment by a German friend:
My friend thought it wouldn't be funny to non-German speakers, so I set this bon mot aside and forgot about it till today. Now, in the age of "Vintage Teslas" (an expression I saw on a bumper sticker yesterday) and whatnot, it may strike a chord with some folks.
"ungeheuer" and "geheuer" are antonyms: "ungeheuer" means "enormous, immense, vast, gigantic, terrible", while "geheuer" means "pleasant, gentle, friendly".
Etymological background and usage notes
(from Wiktionary, with minor modifications by VHM)
heuer
From Middle High German hiure, from Old High German hiuro, hiuru, from hiu (“in this”) + jāru (“year”). Compare German heute from Old High German hiu tagu ("this day").
(Austria, Switzerland, South Tyrol, Liechtenstein, otherwise dialectal) this year
The word is never used in northern and central Germany. It may even—at least by less educated speakers—be misinterpreted as a synonym of heute (“today”). It does however occasionally mean heutzutage (“nowadays”) or heute (“nowadays”), for example:
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- 1654, Salomons von Golaw Deutscher Sinn-Getichte Drey Tausend, Breslau, p. 210, nr. [8]71 Heutige Welt-Kunst:
-
[…]
Wer sich desen wil befleissen
Kan Politisch heuer heissen.
- Whoever makes an effort to do this, nowadays will be considered political. [VHM tentative tr.]
-
- 1654, Salomons von Golaw Deutscher Sinn-Getichte Drey Tausend, Breslau, p. 210, nr. [8]71 Heutige Welt-Kunst:
geheuer
From Middle High German gehiure (“pleasant, gentle”), from Old High German hiuri (“friendly, lovely”), from a suffixed form of or otherwise related to Proto-West Germanic *hīw (“marriage”).
(strong nominative masculine singular geheuerer, not comparable)
- (chiefly in the negative) pleasant, comfortable, sure
- mir war nicht ganz geheuer ― I was not at all sure
-
Bei dem Gedanken an die bevorstehende Prüfung war ihm nicht recht geheuer.
- He was not at all comfortable thinking about the coming exam.
In modern usage, this word is always negated. The expression nicht (ganz) geheuer means ‘creepy, fishy, scary, causing uneasiness’, etc.
ungeheuer
Middle High German ungehiure, Old High German ungihiuri, un- + geheuer
(strong nominative masculine singular ungeheurer, comparative ungeheurer, superlative am ungeheuersten)
-
1915 October, Franz Kafka, “Die Verwandlung [The Metamorphosis]”, in Die Weißen Blätter […] [2], volume 2, number 10, Verlag der Weißen Bücher; republished as Joachim Neugroschel, transl., 1993:
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Als Gregor Samsa eines Morgens aus unruhigen Träumen erwachte, fand er sich in seinem Bett zu einem ungeheuren Ungeziefer verwandelt.
- One morning, upon awakening from agitated dreams, Gregor Samsa found himself, in his bed, transformed into a monstrous / enormous vermin.
-
Ungeheuer
Nominalization of ungeheuer.
n (strong, genitive Ungeheuers, plural Ungeheuer)
-
-
1886, Friedrich Nietzsche, Jenseits von Gut und Böse[1], section 146:
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Wer mit Ungeheuern kämpft, mag zusehn, daß er nicht dabei zum Ungeheuer wird. Und wenn du lange in einen Abgrund blickst, blickt der Abgrund auch in dich hinein.
- He who fights monsters should see to it that he himself does not become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you.
-
-
Selected readings
- "Nondisunnegativity" (12/11/12)
- Pablumese" (3/22/23)
- "Nonnegation" (2/19/22)
- "Not not" (4/15/17) — must read
- "Me either / neither" (6/22/21)
- "*Neither Sentence Nor Sentence?" (11/8/19)
- "'No telling is neither complete nor accurate'" (9/25/16)
- "Everything cannot not be unbelievable, either" (8/10/21)
- "Ambiguous triple negative" (8/11/21)
- "Nothing that wasn't something one might not hear" (2/25/10)
jin defang said,
March 24, 2025 @ 10:45 am
does anybody want to weigh in on "gruntled"?
Victor Mair said,
March 24, 2025 @ 11:05 am
"'Disheveled,' 'Disgruntled': Why Are Some Words Only Used in Negative Form?"
By: Kristen Hall-Geisler, howstuffworks
https://people.howstuffworks.com/lonely-negative.htm
David Marjanović said,
March 24, 2025 @ 11:20 am
I agree with your tentative translation of the 1654 quote; I didn't know this sense existed, though (despite being from Austria and using heuer all the time to mean "this year"), so chances are good that it is extinct.
The -u was the ending of the instrumental case that died out during OHG times.
Chas Belov said,
March 24, 2025 @ 1:23 pm
As I've always mentally heard "disheveled" (I don't think I've ever heard it said aloud in my life) as dish-ev-ld, it wouldn't have occurred to me to parse it as dis-heveled.
As opposed to mishap, which I've heard and know to be pronounced mis-hap and not mish-ap or mih-shap, while the positive hap seems to have once existed in English and disappeared.
cameron said,
March 24, 2025 @ 5:31 pm
does the citation of the passage from Nietzsche indicate that the nominalization of the adjective was a coinage by Nietzsche? or could earlier citations have been adduced?
Coby said,
March 24, 2025 @ 5:36 pm
The prefix un- doesn't always signify negation. Sometimes it's the equivalent of mis- (from the French més-), meaning "bad", as in Unkraut 'weed' (Kraut 'herb').
kempt said,
March 24, 2025 @ 7:21 pm
A not unamusing essay from The New Yorker (1994), wherein the author appears quite gruntled. https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1994/07/25/how-i-met-my-wife
Gokul Madhavan said,
March 25, 2025 @ 5:03 am
Building on Coby’s point above, has there been a comprehensive study of the different meanings of the prefix un- in English or German? I’d be curious to see what kinds of quirky senses pop up.
In Sanskrit, the negation marker (called nañ in the Pāṇinian system) is traditionally held to have six different meanings: similarity, absence, otherness, minuteness, criticism, and logical opposition. I can’t find the citation now, but I remember coming across a Sanskrit text in which each of these was exemplified by a different interpretation of the word ya-brāhmaṇa: “an almost-brahmin warrior”, “a brahmin-free village”, “a person who is not a brahmin”, “a brahmin who might as well not be a brahmin”, “an unbrahminical brahmin”, and “an anti-brahmin person”.
Gokul Madhavan said,
March 25, 2025 @ 5:24 am
Also in Sanskrit, the word asura was famously reinterpreted as a negation from late Vedic or early post-Vedic times, so that the devas could be called the suras while the asuras come to be interpreted largely negatively.
~flow said,
March 25, 2025 @ 5:27 am
I remember a children's book about an Ungeheuer who's growing up. The guy's still rather small and not fearsome at all, yet, so he's called a Geheuer instead.
Ralph Hickok said,
March 25, 2025 @ 7:18 am
Meanwhile, we have "overwhelm" and "underwhelm," but whatever became of "whelm"?
andreasj@gmail.com said,
March 25, 2025 @ 7:22 am
Lord Dunsany sometimes used "whelm", as in the story title "Of How the Gods Whelmed Sidith", but that's probably the only place I've seen it outside discussions like this.
Bybo said,
March 25, 2025 @ 8:06 am
A Geheuer seems like a fictional creature Walter Moers might come up with.
JimG said,
March 25, 2025 @ 8:22 am
The last comment on Prof. Mair's linked posting, re kempt and shevelled, is much worth (re)visiting. See the comment by YosemiteSemite.
Robert Coren said,
March 25, 2025 @ 9:12 am
In modern usage, this word is always negated.
I studied German in college, and have maintained some familiarity with (certain types of) German through my hobby as a classical singer. My first encounter with geheuer, as far as I can recall, was in the 19th-century Eduard Mörike poem Der Feuerreiter (as set by Hugo Wolf), whose third line is "Nichts geheuer muss es sein", translated approximately as "Something uncanny must be going on". I don't think I've ever encountered a non-negated <geheuer.
Rodger C said,
March 25, 2025 @ 11:48 am
A Geheuer is normous and mense.
Cervantes said,
March 25, 2025 @ 1:13 pm
“If he would not be a stick whirled and whelmed in the stream, he must be the stream itself, all of it, from its spring to its sinking in the sea.”
― Ursula K. Le Guin, A Wizard of Earthsea
Olaf Zimmermann said,
March 25, 2025 @ 6:46 pm
Re: The Awful German Language …
Der Un ist es, der die Pein in unser Leben bringt. Wo sind die Zeiten hin, da Hold und Wirsch ihr Wesen trieben? Der Unhold ist geblieben. Er treibt sein Unwesen. Der Hold aber ist längst verblichen. Seht euch um! Wo trefft ihr einen Hold? Nur der Bold ist noch da und dort zu sehen, sein unangenehmer Bruder.
Könnt ihr euch denken, dass es Zeiten gegeben hat, wo es stets erhört war, dass jemandem ein Gemach geschah? Ihr werdet nur von unerhörter Unbill hören, Ungemach wird euch zustoßen und in gemeinen Unflat werdet ihr geraten. Irgendwo aber müssten es doch trotz alledem einen flätigen Menschen geben, einen wirschen Kerl, bei dem es einem sehr geheurer ist und bei dem heimlich noch nicht verstohlen heißt, sondern das wahre Gegenteil von heimlich ist.
Wo ist der Mann zu finden, dieses freundliche Getüm, dieser beholfene Mensch von geschlachteten Manieren? Lasst uns, wenn ihr ihn wisst, ohne Übereilung und mit Gestüm zu ihm gehen. Es passt nicht zu ihm, dass wir ihm mit unbändiger Erwartung entgegentreten. Bündig, aber unverschämt wollen wir sein. Denn Verschämtheit hieße bei uns, die wir das Jünglingsalter verlassen haben, und die wir nicht Unrat zu wittern brauchen, die wir zu einem rätlichen Mensch gehen, der nur freundliches Geziefer um sich hat – Verschämtheit heiße bei uns Unaufrichtigkeit.
Es soll uns ja über die gefährlichen Untiefen unserer Ratlosigkeit hinwegführen, er soll uns sagen, warum es geschehen konnte, dass es von seinen Tugenden nur noch die Verneinungen gibt, und warum die Deutschen der letzten hundert Jahre von vielen sinnigen Dingen nur noch die unförmige Kehrseite kennen, den Unflat, den Unhold, das Ungewitter, den Unrat und das Ungeheuer? Wo ist das Geheuer geblieben, dieses schöne Tier?
Der Un ist ein Übel, das in unserer Sprache sitzt. Die Verantwortlichen sollten es so aufmerksam betrachten wie den Krebs. Werdet nicht von Unwillen erfasst, ihr Akademiker, ihr Unsterblichen, wenn ich euch an eure Pflicht mahne, die deutsche Sprache von der Vergiftung durch die Verneinung zu erretten.
Es ist soweit gekommen, dass ich befürchte, einer von euch möchte diesen Aufsatz nicht unübel finden. Dabei könnte man von ihm nur sagen, dass er nicht übel sei. Dies ist seine einzige Rechtfertigung. Mit Fug dürftet ihr sonst sagen, dass ich nur Unfug treibe. Es liegt bei euch, aus Unsinn Sinn zu machen.
Nichts für ungut!
Olaf Zimmermann said,
March 25, 2025 @ 7:16 pm
Sorry, (Use the source, Luke), I forgot:
Leo Spitzer. (1940). Le Manque d'argent qui se fait rare. Modern Language Notes, 55(5), 332–338
Bybo said,
March 26, 2025 @ 4:01 am
Welch sprachliche Untiefen! Or … not?
Kate Bunting said,
March 26, 2025 @ 5:31 am
Also the last verse of Cowper's 'The Castaway' (comparing himself to a man fallen from a ship):
No voice divine the storm allay'd,
No light propitious shone;
When, snatch'd from all effectual aid,
We perish'd, each alone:
But I beneath a rougher sea,
And whelm'd in deeper gulfs than he.