Hello everyone,
and welcome to another episode of our mini series about German Prefix Verbs. Today we’ll look at the meaning of
einkommen
and this verb is super special because… it has zero meanings. Tadah. Okay, I can’t rule out that it’s part of some regional dialect or that it has some other niche uses but in daily life it means nothing. Case closed. See you next week.
Nah… of course there’s a reason why we’re talking about this. For one thing there’s the noun das Einkommen which does mean income… but the main reason why einkommen is worth a look is the fact that it’s a really really great example for the whole “prefix verb vs its r-version”-stuff. And if you’re now like “Wait, the what?” then this is for you :). Knowing what an r-version is, and having a feel for what it does what the prefix verbs usually DON’T do is really really helpful… or at least I think it is. So let’s take a look at this.
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Greetings Emanuel….
What purpose does “mit” serve here? Is it necessary?
Willst du mit rein kommen und meine Briefmarkensammlung sehen?
Danke
It “stresses” the idea of giving the person company. So Person A is going inside anyway, and invites the other person to join.
If person A was already inside, it would be just “reinkommen”. So the mit expresses that the do the act of entering together.
Does that help?
Is this r-version meaning pretty much standard? For example, the word einschließen. How would you say something like, “Do I have to lock/shut you in there?” I have a few ways, maybe you can explain the differences.
Muss ich dich einschließen?
Muss ich dich reinschließen?
Muss ich dich drinnen einschließen?
Are any/all of these correct, and which sounds the most natural to you?
The first one is the standard for “to lock in”. The last one also works but it sounds a bit redundant. The version with “reinschließen” doesn’t work because “rein” implies a directed movement from outside to inside and that doesn’t go well with “schließen” which isn’t about movement at all. I was thinking about a context for “reinschließen” but I couldn’t really find anything. The tecnical meaning would be “getting from outside to inside by locking”… no idea if that evokes a context in English.
Hope that helps
That is clear in this instance, but I’m still having trouble with other examples. How about taking a pill?
Ich nehme die Pille rein.
Ich nehme die Pille ein.
There’s definitely a directed movement there, but I’m pretty sure rein is incorrect here.
I’m also confused about the ein-prefix in general in many cases, as the “in/into” guideline is not always clear. First one that comes to mind is sammeln vs. einsammeln. I can’t see how you would gather “into” something. Unless we’re talking about a mouse gathering cheese and collecting it inside its mouse hole.
Die Maus sammelt den Käse.
Die Maus sammelt den Käse ein.
Is there a difference?
Good questions… for taking a pill, you’d say “einnehmen”. “reinnehmen” would be a correct sentence as well but it would mean that the pill is outside somewhere and you take it in into a room. So there’s not really a context for it, I guess. But you’re right, that the “ein” does have a notion of directed movement. The point is not that it can’t have that. The point is that “r”-versions pretty much always (well, almost always) have it so they won’t go well with a stationary context. That’s not to say that the base prefix can’t also express a directed moevment.
Try not to get too hung up on definitions. The more you try to fixate these things, the less you’ll get a hold of it. Try to think of trends instead of rules.
As for “einsammeln”.. “sammeln” by itself is just generic collecting and you can technically have your collections spread out over the whole world. The “ein” adds a notion of inward in so far as that you bring things that were “out” in the world toward one point. You kind of put them in a virtual pocket, if you will.
– Ich sammele Puzzleteile.
This means that you’re collecting puzzle pieces like someone collects stamps.
– Ich sammele Puzzleteile ein.
This means that puzzle pieces are spread out somewhere, in your room or something, and you pick em all up to store them away.
hope that helps.
Du hast zwei ‘s’ in Einkommenssteuerrückerstattung .
Ja, das müssen 2 sein… Einkommens-steuer.. die Steuer deS EinkommenS :)
GoogleTranslate sagt dass nur ein ‘s’ notwendig ist.
Oooooops… ich hab’ jetzt mal geguckt, und du hast RECHT. Das hat nur ein “s”. Ich bin wirklich erschüttert :D, denn ich spreche auch “EinkommenS-steuer”… ohne “s” klingt total scheiße für meine Ohren. Aber gut, offiziell gibt es da offenbar keine zwei Meinungen. Wieder was gelernt. Danke dir :)
Update… der Duden (die de facto bench spelling bench mark) sagt, dass beides geht. Phew.
Also, das ist wirklich nur ein komischer Steuerbehördensprech.
Die überwiegende Tendenz im Deutschen ist es, bei solchen Zusammensetzungen nach dem Infinitiv immer das Fugen-s einzufügen. Es gibt nur ein paar Ausnahmen – das Steuerrecht und einzelne Wörter wie Erdbeben- (vorsorge, dienst), Andenken- (laden, buch) u.Ä. Ich vermute mal, diese können als Pluralformen aufgefasst werden (die Vorsorge für die Erdbeben, der Laden der Andenken, die Steuern auf die Einkommen).
Hallo! Danke für deine Beiträge! Ich wollte wissen, hast du dir dies schon angeschaut?
https://ankisrs.net/
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Ich finde, Anki ist super! Was hälst du von Flashcards?
Ich persönlich finde das gut. Ich habe für Französich und Italienisch so ganz viele Vokabeln gelernt. Aber “old school”, also nicht mit Anki.
Ich hab’ übrigens tatsächlich vor, Anki Flashcards für jeden Post machen. Sobald mich genug Leute bei Patreon unterstützen geht’s los :)
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Einkommenssteuerrückerstattung – hat Thomas Geld zuruck bekommt (auf Englisch – a tax refund) oder ist dies das Formular dass man ausfullen muss um die Regierung zu sagen wieviel Steur mann zahlen muss? (auf Englisch – doing your tax return – etwas was niemand gern habt!)
Danke fur das wunderbare Blog und entschuldigung dass mein Deutsch so schlect ist – ich habe auf der Uni vor 30 Jahren gelernt und versuche jetzt es zu verbessern.
Ohhh, mein Fehler…. die Einkommenssteuerrückerstattung ist das Geld, das du wiederkriegst. Das andere heißt “Einkommenssteuererklärung” (lit.: income tax declaration). Ich hatte es falsch übersetzt, weil ich dachte “return” wäre schon der “refund” :). Über die Einkommenssteuererklärung freut sich natürlich niemand. Ausser der Steuerberater.
Ach so… dein Deutsch ist völlig ok, nicht perfekt, aber super verständlich, und die Satzstruktur ist gut (und das ist wichtig). Kein Grund, dich zu entschuldigen :).
“Herein!” meaning “Come in!”? I’d love to know why you don’t use it. Old fashioned? Regional? Or just not your top pick?
In the example “In der ersten Halbzeit sind wir nicht gut reingekommen.” I assume that “the game” is football, but I’m not sure whether it’s about a team not playing well, spectators not being interested, or either. The English version could be either, depending on context. In the English “first half” and context would be enough for “the game” to be just “it”.
I simply forgot about it :). “Herein” is not regional or anything and it’s used for telling people to come in after they’ve knocked on the door. So if you’re a manager or something it’s definitely useful… but I wouldn’t use it with friends and even at work where I do have a door for people to knock on, me personally I just say “ja” or “jup”. So I guess we could call it formal.
As for the other examples, it’s about the team not playing well. They don’t get into the rhythm or the flow of the game. Hope that helps :)
Ja, das hilft. Danke.
Now I know what Brazilians might have said (if they spoke German) about their World Cup 2014 semi-final. Nach mal in der zweiten Halbzeit.
Ja, das war ein extremes Beispiel von “nicht ins Spiel (rein)kommen”… (wenn da “ins Spiel” steht, dann kann man “rein” weglassen, aber umgangssprachlich macht man es manchmal trotzdem… vor allem, wenn man grade 90 gespielt hat :)
You can still have a fit of pique… I think? (Which – I think – more or less means spit the dummy)
Just accidentally found your blog while looking up for some word meanings, and now just couldn’t stop reading all your older posts. Thanks so much for all your articles! They made so much of my German problems clear. Definitely gonna follow your blog from now on!
Willkommen an Bord :)
You’ve mentioned the ‘r-version’ in a few of your posts, but have you ever written one exclusively about that? I’m not sure I fully grasp it based on the sporadic mentions.
Thanks for the articles!
No, I don’t have a post that’s only about the r-version. I gave some background on it in the first ever episode of this series
https://yourdailygerman.wordpress.com/2015/05/18/aufmachen-meaning/
but I think I’ll do some sort of post or something so people can look it up quickly. The thing is that it’s not a linguistic concept or anything and there are also not fixed rules. It’s just a trend that for the basic everyday verbs the combination of the local meaning of the prefix and the verb is not gonna be .,. well… what you’d expect from such a combination. “Auflegen” is not “to lay something on top of something”, “einfallen” is not “to fall into something”, “aussehen” is not “looking outside” and so on. Hope that helps a bit.
These r-version posts are really helpful. Does it always work to replace “rein” with “herein”? “Komm bitte herein”? And this question may not make sense but should r-versions only be thought of as with ‘her’ and not ‘hin’? Obviously there’s no ‘r’ in hin but thusfar I’ve been thinking of her/hin as two sides of the same coin. So if I were standing inside my house and said to someone outside at the door “Kommen Sie bitte rein”, they’re coming in, moving towards me. But what if I’m standing outside with them and I want to say “Come inside with me”, would it still be rein or could I say “Komm hinein”? (Or maybe you can’t even use kommen and have to use gehen?) I think I’ve heard “Wirf das Gemüse in der Kochtopf rein”, so is that herein, or hinein as I would assume?
In case of “reinkommen” you can use “herein” instead quite often. It just depends on context a bit how formal it sounds.
– Komm bitte herein.
Sounds a bit stilted/formal/serious.
– Ich komme nicht in meinen Account herein.
This sounds a bit odd to my ears, like… overly formal. I would never say that and if it comes with an accent I’d think “Aha… text book German”… not that there’s something wrong with that :)
As far as “her” and “hin” go… your image with two sides of the same coin is pretty good. But there is a LOT of regional variation when it comes to the use of those. I (Berlin) tend to use “her” for movements directed to “me” (herkommen is common, hinkommen not so much for location), “hin” for movements that are away in a way (hingehen is common, hergehen not so much) and “r” as just a generic movement marker. But in the west, people say “hergehen” and they mean “go along”… confusing to me. IN the South I think they have a strong crush on “hin” and I think they might use it where I would definitely use “her” but I don’t have an example right now. IN real Bavarian dialect they also use an “n”-version where I would use an “r”-version…. but they’re not strict about the directions then either “neingehen, neinkommen”
As for the example with the pot
If I had to spell it out I would go for “hineinwerfen” since the veggies are going away from the thrower. “Hereinwerfen” sounds weird, like from the perspective of inside the pot. But still I would say “reinwerfen” in daily life.
A Bavarian might say “neinwerfen”…. so yeah.. this was pretty long and jumbled but I hope you got an idea. Your understanding is pretty spot on but Germans are not all that consistent about it so don’t freak out if you see an odd use :)
Thanks, that’s really helpful. “Hergehen” which you say they use in the West is exactly what I was wondering about. I haven’t heard of the “n-versions” but that’s also helpful too, will have to keep an eye/ear out for it.
Here’s an example for the “nein”-thing :)
https://www.bayrisches-woerterbuch.de/suchergebnisse/
Doesn’t ‘r’ come from word ‘her’ ? reinkommen = hereinkommen.
Here, it does and “hereinkommen” is valid too, though formal/novelish. But for other verbs spelling out the “her” would sound really weird in normal speech. And sometimes it also comes from “dar” rather than “her”. It’s fine to know where it comes from but that really doesn’t mean that the spelled out version is idiomatic. Sometimes the “her” and the “r” version even have slightly different meanings. That’s why I think r-version deserves to be regarded as a thing… for spoken language, anyway.
“didn’t really get into it” is exactly what you’d say in English. Also “couldn’t get into it” or “it didn’t grab me”.
In English, interest isn’t spawned, but it can be piqued: “The book piqued my interest.” I think the word pique isn’t really used anywhere else anymore, just in that context.
Danke dir :)
So, as you once mentioned, r-versions are kind of direct meanings for locations. Still, there must an exception, otherwise it’s not German
So true :). Of course that’s not set in stone… as soon as you stray away from the common verbs the simple prefix-verb-combo works fine in the literal sense. Just today I thought about “ausspucken” which is “to spit out”.. and it’s not “rausspucken”, even though that’s kind of what I keep preaching. So..these are not fixed rules at all… but for the basic verbs it’s pretty consistent and I want you guys to get a feel for it. That’s why I keep talking about it :)
why did you not mention herein, for heaven’s sake!?
To be completely honest… I simply forgot because I never use it. But you’re completely 100000% right. I’ll add it tomorrow. Thanks for the push :)