“Quality“
Hi everyone,
day 17 of our German Advent Calendar, we’re entering the final (and best) stretch, and the inspiration for today came when I got my Flat White from my interns, because that was … pure TORMENT!!
Nah, I’m kidding. The coffee was fine, great effort guys, keep it up.
“Thanks. Will you pay us now!”
Aw, come on… do I look like Money-Jesus?
“Money-Jesus isn’t a thing, and it’s offensive, Emanuel.”
Look, let’s talk later, okay. I’m in the middle of the Advent Calendar.
So, I actually got the idea when I was writing about Quark, because the German word for torment is
die Qual
Torment belongs to the same family as extort, torture and torque and it goes back to the awesome Indo-European root twerk which was about shaking that primal boota… wait, hold on, I mixed something up, I’m sorry. The root in this case was terkw-, and the core idea was twisting.
Qual on the other hand comes from the root *gu̯el- which was about the idea of (stinging) pain. And German Qual is of course not the only offspring. In Russian for instance, there’s the verb жалить (“zhalit”) which is what mosquitoes do. And more importantly, it’s also the origin of the Slavic words for pity, compassion…. like the Bulgarian word for “I am sorry” Съжалявам (“sezhalavam“), which literally kind of means “I pain/sting myself.”
And also English has descendants from that root. Namely to quell which is a softened version of the old English cwellan; and to kill, which is the non-softened version.
The German Qual is kind of in the middle and means agony or torment.
- “Wie war das Date?”
“Die reine Qual… so langweilig.” - “How was the date?
“Pure agony… so boring.”
- Wer die Wahl hat hat die Qual.
- The more choices, the harder it gets to choose.
Lit.: “He who has the choice has the torment.”
- “Hefe oder Pils?”
“Uff… die Qual der Wahl.“ - “Wheat beer or pils?”
“Uff… the agony of choice.”
These last two expressions are a little bit weird by the way. I mean… the agony of choice … maybe it’s just me, but that low-key reeks of SOCIALISM!!
I grew up in former East Germany and there, we only had one type of corn flakes. And they weren’t made from corn, but from potatoes. And they weren’t flakes but … whole potatoes. I would gladly have agonized over some choice then.
Oh hey, and speaking of agonizing…. that brings us to the verb for die Qual, which is quälen.
- “Warum hab ich mein Date nach ihrem Gewicht gefragt. Ich bin so dumm.”
“Ja bist du. Aber jetzt hör auf dich damit zu quälen.” - “Why did I ask my date for her weight. I am so stupid.”
“Yes, you are. But now stop torturing yourself with it.”
- Massentierhaltung ist Tierquälerei.
- Factory farming is animal abuse/torture.
And of course let’s not forget about one of the most famous related noun: die Qualität.
Nah, I’m joking. That actually doesn’t relate to Qual. It would make sense, though, because achieving true quality can be quite the pain.
Anyway, that’s it for today.
Have a great day and bis morgen.
Oh, by the way… Etymonline.com, where I check for English etymology, actually mentions “to throw” as the core idea of the Indo-European root of kill and Qual and sees the piercing, pain as an extension of that. Possibly as a result of throwing a spear. And if you were to follow that track a little you’d find that there is a connection between Qual and parliament.
If you want to dig into that, here’s the link :)
The root *gwele- on Etymonline
I love the Etymology! I laughed when you wrote “twerk which was about shaking that primal boota…”.
I also found it interesting that you chose this word for your advent calendar as some people find Christmas agonizing and “die reine Qual” while for others is pure bliss.
Actually, the idea for Qual came right in lockstep with “Quark”. I was like “Wait, how many Qua-words are there?!” And I already had Quatsch last year. But yeah… Qual is a nice word to have, but it’s not “big” enough for a normal article, so the calendar is a great fit.
Ps… glad to hear someone got the twerking!
All diese Etymologie quält mich.
Fascinating! From the same *guel root in Russian there is also the lovely word жаль meaning “too bad” or “what a pity”.
Ich habe eine Frage zu Deinem Satz: “Aber jetzt hör auf dich damit zu quälen.”
Ist eine andere Ordnung der Wörter möglich? Warum “damit zu quälen”? Hört man nicht mit etwas auf?
— Aber jetzt hör dich damit zu quälen auf.
— Aber jetzt hör dich auf, damit zu quälen.
— Aber jetzt hör dich mit quälen auf.
Danke schön!
The first one of your options works, but it sounds a bit overly fancy to me. zu-constructions with a self reference and a da-word are better “after” the final verb.
The second one is wrong, because the “sich” belongs to “quälen” and you can’t just move it into another sentence (the hör-part).
And the third one doesn’t work because you’d need to include the self reference in the noun.
– Hör auf mit dem Dich selbst Quälen.
That would work, though it sounds a bit clunky :)
I find these articles very interesting, I’ve always liked learning about etymologies, I think it makes learning easier because it helps you connect words and remember them easier. Thank you for taking the time to make this Advent Calendar special :) they are amazing and I try to read them every day! :)
Now, I’m relatively new, I found out about you while listening to the EasyGerman Podcast in September, so I’m not sure if you really have unpaid interns or you just joke about it, but I really don’t like those parts :( just my humble opinion, please don’t hate me!
For what it’s worth… I don’t have any interns :)
You need more interns to help you to record more poetry !!
Danke, danke. Die Satze heute sind genial.
Ich habe mich oft gefragt, woher kommt das Verb parler (to talk) auf Französisch. Die Wurzel gwele!
Daher TALKING ist eigentlich TORTURE.
I love it!
Hi Enmanuel,
When I read “quark”, my first thought was about the elementary particles. Then, I saw the word “glue” and my mind went to “gluons”.
Yesterday, as you were talking about strange philosophers, I wondered if today you were taught as about “particle physics” in German. I wasn’t too wrong, it was another kind of torment…”etymology” (just kidding).
Regards
Physics intensifies :)
For the record… physics was one of my “special picks” in high school (the other one being math). I really like physics. It makes sense to me, much more so than chemistry.
Enough already … Poetry should be compulsory :-)
Oh yeah? Name one device in our daily lives that exists because of POETRY! I can give you at least 10 for physics.
(kidding of course!)
Sehr interresenter umfangreicher Wortschatz des Wort Qual und seines abgeleites Verb Quälen.
Es hat mich nicht gequält, sonst sogar viel gefreut ! Vielen Dank dafür.
Bis Morgen
Ich glaube du meinst “sondern” und nicht “sonst” ,oder :)?
Ja, Dankeschön.Ich meinte diesen Muster: ……..nicht nur/……..sondern….. .
I have no QUALMS about liking this post
Oh, nice one :)
QUAL der Wahl of the “Dark Side” — To vape or not to vape.
Sind Qualm (Deutsch) und qualm (English) irgendwie unbewusst eng verwandt?
Wie Luke Skype – walker und Darth Vaper?
:D:D:D Darth Vaper… that’s a great one!!!
Qualm also relates to “Quelle” and there is no mention of a connection to “Qual”.
Most puns are for the ear, which is why they are beloved by musicians. This is a clever pun for the eye!
I totally get it!!
(not)
If etymonline is to be believed, the verb to quail is also related – but not the noun quail (the bird).
Yeah, to quail in fear, or someone’s courage never quailed. Maybe because it can feel like fear is stabbing through you sometimes? I used to picture quails running away though. Little guys are pretty cute.
That’s an interesting twist. I ended up at the entry on parable – so throwing two meanings side by side turned into “word,” which turned into talking. And there you are at palavering, which happens a lot in parliament.
The 11 and 17 are cute btw.
So…the jellyfish—die Qualle. Does that mean ‘the stinger’ or ‘the giver of agony’? Either way… owa!
DWDS says it’s related to Quelle/quellen. Are the ones you find in the North or Baltic Seas stingy?
Some in the Baltic sea are. But the ones in the Mediterranean are definitely worse.
Not sure of they have a Petermännchenfisch there, though. That one sounds AWFUL!
We encountered jellyfish on the coast of Wales – the Irish Sea or Bristol Channel I guess. And they were HUGE…but luckily dead and just washed up on the shore. Kinda puts you off swimming….
Oh, it absolutely does. Ever since I got stung I am not so hot about “taking a bath in the Atlantic”. Lakes for the win!!
Ophhhh, I got stung by a jelly fish a couple of years ago and I still have a scar on my arm.
Etymologically, those suckers tie in with “die Quelle” (the source, the spring) though… something about bloating.