“Of Cones and Taps“
Hello everyone,
welcome back to our Advent Calendar, day number five . And behind this door, there’s something that you can also find on the ground when you take a walk in the forest. Small, like a baby fist maybe, dry, egg shaped, rough surface, brown… I’m of course talking about droppings. Conifer droppings to be precise, also known as Tannenzapfen.
“Emanuel, the cones of a pine tree are not droppings! They carry the seed for new life.”
Oh… so it’s like conifer sper… okay, okay, I’ll stop with the analogies. For now :).
So yeah, Zapfen is the German word for the cone of a conifer tree (conifers are actually called conifers because they carry cones).
But that’s not the only use for it.
Another Zapfen we can find in winter is the Eiszapfen, which is German for icicle. You know, these pointy, thin ice-things that hang from roofs. And if you caught a bad cold as a kid and you just couldn’t swallow the antibiotic pill, you might have ended up with a Zäpfchen (suppository) up your buttocks.
But by FAR the most important Zapfen is the Bier zapfen. Because that means to draft beer.
And that makes more sense than you might initially think. The origin is not entirely clear, but it’s probably a Germanic syllable that carried the idea of “something pointy”.
Besides Zapfen, this is also the origin of der Zopf, which is what you do with your hair (plait, pigtail) and the noun der Zipfel which is basically a corner of a fabric… yeah, German has a word for that. Like, your pillow for instance has a Zipfel and the dwarfs from Snow White are wearing what is called a Zipfelmütze.
But the real reveal are the English relatives… get ready for a big surprise. The German word Zapfen is related to tip, top and tap.
Makes sense, if you think about it. They’re all about a something pointy.
And THAT is the reason why zapfen means to draft. Back in the day, beer would be in barrels and in order to draft it, you would put a tap, a cone-shaped pointy thing, into the barrel.
So there you have it. Now you know what a German pine cone (Kieferzapfen) has to do with drafting beer (Bier zapfen) and that a tap is called tap because it is pointy like a tip.
Feel free to put this trivia to use in one of those awkward silences at Christmas dinner. Like…
“… swear to God, I will disown you!”
“… “
“… “
“… uh… guys, did you know that tap is related to the German word for suppository?”
Works wonders :)
And that’s it for today.
Have a great one and bis morgen :).
Zapfen is related to Tip, Top and Tap!
How about this Swedish Chrissy song with the Tipp, Tipp Topp refrain then!
https://hooktube.com/watch?time_continue=33&v=54ElHAX4zLI
In English, “Zapping” as in channel roulette with the remote control… Like the remote control is a pointy thing and you Zap with it. Yet another German-English relationship. Wouldn’t really want a remote-control up my b… though.
I didn’t check, but I’m almost sure “zapping” is an onomatopoeia :). Though a relation would make sense… you “tap” into the TV.
Does anyone else have Gravatars next to the comments? Mine are gone. Aoind pointed this out, assuming I was on an iPhone, but I see that I no longer have Gravatars on the computer or iPad. Chrissy Magic? Unicorn prank? Parallel universe?
Okay, so over the last two weeks I made some modifications to have my site load faster, because it is freaking SLOW! But apparently, one piece of software was overly zealous and instead of just caching some Gravatar images, it stopped loading from there alltogether :/. It’s fixed now.
The other thing is with the audio on Firefox. But that might be a Firefox thing. I never liked this browser because clearly it has issues displaying stuff that others (Chrome, Opera) have no problem with. Firefox is a real Diva.
Chrome on PC, Safari on Mac. Fitmrefix is indeed a Diva.
Fitmrefix :D… nice. Auto correct is doing poetry
Yes. Audio has been misbehaving on Firefox, but works fine through the thoughtfully provided link to mp3. Some things seem only to be problems with Firefox in combination with a no longer supported version of Windows.
You have just persuaded me to try Opera.
Nach O’Zapft ist in Minga (München) der Teufel los! Der Bürgermeister, ganz festlich gekleidet, trägt eine Bierzipfe. Und ohne Zapfen liegt das Bierzelt „leblos“am Boden,- flach ohne Dach!
PROST! & Real Germans do drink Bier zum Frühstück :+)
Moin Moin
Für die Lerner… O’Zapft is Bavarian dialect for “angezapft”. The verb “anzapfen” is when you put the tap into the barrel. The English phrasing “to tap into” has a similar idea, though it’s not used for beer :)
This I learned at my wedding deep in the heart of Bavaria…at midnight during the wedding celebration the happy groom must tap the beer keg. I understood that part much better than the wedding ceremony in fact, my German was much worse than it is today. Thanks to you!
Oh, so you’re one of the people who learn German for love? I was surprised at how many there were :). That’s pretty cool!
Me too! (die Hochzeit war im Juli, aber leider habe ich nicht gewählt, ein riesiges Holzfass zu bezahlen und das Anzapfen zu genießen!)
Glückwunsch!!!
I’m talking about the survey we did a few days ago (for those who are confused now)
Hi, Emanuel!
Laughed out loud over the suppository thing!!
Two really small typos (gosh, I’m starting to feel like the Grinch, so I’ll let you know that yesterday’s post did wonders for my vocabulary and listening skills, I felt I had to say this to make up for all this meanness): “the cone of a pine tree are not droppings! It carries…” – cones and they carry – and “thin ice-thing that hang from roofs” – hangs. I know this is finicky, but let’s make the posts perfect :))))
Bis morgen!
Ha! I did not know that in English “tapping a barrel” was “drafting”.
Makes sense , “Beer on draft, Draft Beer. Meaning beer direct from the barrel, not from bottles
Also spelt Draught.in England
Learn English with YourDailyGerman :)
I’m not sure you’d say you “draft a beer” in American English, even though you might refer to it as “draft beer” if it’s from a keg/barrel. In my experience, “beer on tap” is generally more common; technically “tapping” is how you get the barrel/keg started. After that, you “draw” a beer – which is where “draught = draft” comes from, “beer drawn from the tap.” My sense is that AE tends to use “pour” for a beer, even from a tap, but my experience is limited and anecdotal there.
Well, I just learned where “draught” comes from :)
an’ a prosit to that great type of artist of type – Hermann Zapf
http://www.historygraphicdesign.com/the-age-of-information/the-international-typographic-style/254-hermann-zapf
Enjoyed this link. Thank you – and Herman Zapf.
I am enjoying this Advent Calendar very much. Vielen Dank. Ich habe viele Dinge diese Woche gelernt! I look forward to learning much more.
Freut mich. Weiter viel Spaß :)
Um. It’s like, 09.36 Berlin time on DECEMBER 7th and still no neues Türchen. Are we heading for another time-warp “Türchen”? You know, the kind that mean that we jump over a day and blame it on a time warp? Unicorn stole die siebten Türchen? The siebte Türchen shrank vom St Nikolaus?
Need my fix, dude, experiencing intense Advent Calendar Withdrawl here…
Are you OK? Do you need to be rescued? Tell us where and we’ll be there en masse!
I’m actually having a really bad cold but the post should be up. I’ll check it :/
Thank-you!
I am loving this Advent calendar. Nice to get a daily chuckle and learn something new each day. By the way, on your recommendation I have subscribed to Seedlang. I think is great . I love how it stresses spoken exercises. It is great to see you in some of the videos. Channing Tatum has nothing on you. :)
Well he has better stripper moves :). Seriously though, thanks for the great feed back. Ich freu mich, dass es dir Spa ß macht!!
Who IS Channing Tatum? Ich gehe ein bis viel Mal in der Woche ins Kino aber ich weiß NICHT wer diese Channing Tatum ist. Ist sie Blondin? Dem Name nach, ist sie ein bisschen wie Cameron Diaz. Vielleicht soll ich andere Filmen sehen oder die Klatschspalten lesen.
Uhm…. you might have been missing out…
Channing Tatum is a GUY! Oy. Nope, not my type. Prefer the liberal intellectuals. Sucker for a nice pair of shoes. UND…
Männer riechen nach Windeln bis sie 40 Jahre alt sind. Mit 40 riechen sie nach Männer, aber haben nicht genug Übung. Mit 50 sind sie reif. Die Männer im Video sind Kinder. (Kindern – n-deklension?). Männer sehen aber besser aus mit Kleider.
Hmmm…. aber was ist mit den Abs und Pecs und Glutes??
How about: zapfstelle (gas station), zapfsäule (gas pump), zapfwart (gas station attendant), or are there more colloquial synonyms ?
Oh, I totally forgot about those. The only one still common is zapfsäule. The other two I know a Tankstelle and Tankwart.
I recalled a Slavonic word Zaponka which means a cufflink . It derived from old Slavonic zapjat( to cling) . A cone clips to the fir tree. Perhaps, Zapfen is the reflection of Indo -European roots . I mag diesel Wort . Thaaanks
Might be, but there’s no evidence for it (and there might be evidence against). The German and the English etymological dictionary said that it’s probably onomatopoeia…. though I don’t really know how the “top” of something would sound :)