31
votes
Why the frequent use of “Bad” in German place names (and does it mean something different than “bath”)?
The German "Bad" corresponds to the English "Spa". Towns containing a "Heilbad" may carry the protected title "Bad" and many of them do.
- 381
30
votes
Why Ölberg and not Olivenberg?
Considering that another name for Olivenbaum is Ölbaum and the biological family is Ölbaumgewächse (Oleaceae), Ölberg with the meaning of “mountain of olive trees” makes sense to me.
Ölberg has ...
- 23.9k
26
votes
Everyday German: Asking for a bus-ticket
No, this isn't right.
Einmal nach Tübingen, bitte.
would be fine. You can think of it as a short form of
Einen Fahrschein für die Fahrt nach Tübingen, bitte.
But you could also say
Einmal ...
- 18.9k
24
votes
Why the frequent use of “Bad” in German place names (and does it mean something different than “bath”)?
German towns can participate in a certification process to allow to carry a rating as Bad in their town name.
By German federal law strict prerequisites have to be met by an applicant, e.g.:
...
- 70.1k
21
votes
Is "Rotenstrand" a correct term?
You can say "Oderstrand" or "Rheinufer" because you would not say "Oder Fluss" or "Rhein Fluss".
The Red River (at least the one in Asia) is translated as "Roter Fluss" so you would have to say "am ...
- 4,418
20
votes
Everyday German: Asking for a bus-ticket
Zu cannot be used with towns and cities. It can only be used with
buildings
Zum Rathaus
Zum Hauptbahnhof
squares and streets
Zum Berliner Platz
Zur Friedrich-Wilhelm-Straße
To reference ...
- 38.4k
19
votes
Accepted
Why does “Schweiz” form the corresponding adjective like a city?
The origin of the name "Schweiz" is indeed the name of the town "Schwyz" and the canton with the same name.
In the 14th century the Swiss people were actually called "Eidgenossen". After a battle (...
- 11.5k
16
votes
»The Hague« in English = »Den Haag« in German. Why not »Der Haag« or »Das Haag«?
We simply use the Dutch name of that city and don't translate it into German - And that happens to be Den Haag.
The fact that this looks like "den", the accusative of "der" is pure coincidence (or ...
- 60.7k
16
votes
Accepted
Why Ölberg and not Olivenberg?
The German Ölberg is a gravely wrong translation of the Greek name for the Mount of Olives ὄρος τῶν ἐλαιῶν (oros ton elaion). The Greek version is absolutely unambiguous when spoken, or written with ...
- 1,222
16
votes
Accepted
Warum ist die Bezeichnung "Roter Weg" so häufig?
Roth, auch Rötel oder Rot kommt in erstaunlich vielen Flur- Gewässer- und Gemeindenamen überall im deutschen Sprachraum (nicht nur NRW und BW) vor.
Rötel ist eine Bezeichnung für eine mineralische ...
- 60.7k
15
votes
Why Ölberg and not Olivenberg?
As you can see from your examples, Öl is a more archaic usage. The substance known as "oil" was originally only derived from olives (which was constrained to the Mediterranean area in those days). ...
- 401
15
votes
Why Ölberg and not Olivenberg?
I cannot prove the following, but would assume it makes sense.
The Lutherian bible was translated into German 1545 - Most probably no one in the intended audience would have had an idea what an "...
- 60.7k
14
votes
Accepted
What are the relative pronouns of cities?
All nouns have a gender – a couple allegedly even three, but no name is ungendered. You just have to find out which. In this case, cities (and most countries) are regularly neuter. That rule is ...
- 30.5k
13
votes
Why the frequent use of “Bad” in German place names (and does it mean something different than “bath”)?
You asked only about Germany, and TimWolla's answer is also correct for Austria, but not for Switzerland. (These are the three biggest countries where German is an official language.)
The reason, why ...
- 118k
12
votes
Accepted
»The Hague« in English = »Den Haag« in German. Why not »Der Haag« or »Das Haag«?
Den Haag is the Dutch name of the city. The den in there is not considered a German accusative masculine definite article (or a German plural dative definite article) but an integral part of the city’...
- 38.4k
12
votes
Accepted
What is the origin of the "-ingen" suffix in town names in Europe, particularly Germany?
The suffix "-ingen" describes the affilation to a leader or a person in general. So in Sigmaringen lived the relatives of Sigmar.
This is not a swabian thing, as you can find many town names with ...
- 11.5k
12
votes
Definite articles - cities, lakes
Your first assumption would be correct, if there wasn't that last word of the sentence...
The sentence reads:
Neue Parkvorschriften im Ortskern
and Simbacher is only a descriptive attribute to ...
- 9,408
12
votes
Pronunciation of "oe" in place names
The explanation is that Coesfeld is situated in a region influenced by Middle Dutch. The e is a lengthening vocal in this case ("Dehnungs-e").
This is similar to Dutch. In German, this ...
- 15.3k
11
votes
Accepted
Warum unterscheidet sich das englische Ethnonym für »preußisch« vom Deutschen?
Zunächst Preußen. Dieser Name leitet sich von einem baltischen Volksstamm ab, dessen Eigenbezeichnung *Prūsai (rekonstruiert aus dem Adjektiv prūsiskan) war. Dieser Stamm besiedelte das Gebiet, das in ...
- 38.4k
11
votes
Gender of German rivers?
The bottom line is you'd need a full historical record of each hydronym you'd like to analyze.
I cite http://m.spiegel.de/kultur/zwiebelfisch/a-364172.html
Das Geschlecht von Flüssen lässt sich ...
- 1,004
11
votes
Pronunciation of "oe" in place names
Names of places are often centuries old and have not been adapted to modern spellings. For a bit of fun, consider the place names Voerde, Itzehoe and Buchloe where the oe is pronounced as /øː/, /oː/ ...
- 38.4k
11
votes
Was bedeutet „Feuchtwangen“ auf Englisch?
The problem with names is that long age often obscures their origin: The original meaning is lost or reinterpreted; changes in pronunciation and spelling occur.
The German Wikipedia entry for ...
- 24.5k
10
votes
Accepted
Warum haben Stadtnamen keine Artikel?
Die grundsätzliche Regel lautet:
Eigennamen stehen in der Regel ohne Artikel
An sich reicht das schon als Antwort, steht trotzdem einer da, ist es entweder eine akzeptierte Ausnahme, oder falsch. ...
- 60.7k
9
votes
Why does “Schweiz” form the corresponding adjective like a city?
This rule actually refers to "geographical names" rather than just cities - the capitalisation of "Schweizer" thus just follows the rules :)
D 90:
Von geografischen Namen abgeleitete Wörter ...
- 7,188
9
votes
Is "Rotenstrand" a correct term?
It only works for rivers which don't need that river extension to be recognized.
So, Oh London, du Zasterpfuhl am Themsestrand (Oh London, you boodle puddle on Thames' banks) works, but for the Red ...
- 51.8k
9
votes
Was bedeutet „Feuchtwangen“ auf Englisch?
The German Wikipedia entry to Feuchtwangen offers the etymology.
Der Name geht auf das Bestimmungswort fiuchta (Fichte) und das Grundwort -wang (Wiesenhang, Aue) zurück. Es liegt *Fiuhtinwanga (mit ...
- 17.9k
8
votes
»The Hague« in English = »Den Haag« in German. Why not »Der Haag« or »Das Haag«?
As others have pointed out: Den Haag is a Dutch name, adopted without change in German. In the source language "den" is a local or archaic variant of "de", the definite article for masc. and fem. sing....
- 3,298
8
votes
What is the origin of the "-ingen" suffix in town names in Europe, particularly Germany?
-ingen (or -ing,-ung, -engo and others) denotes affiliation to a person, place or geographic landmark. It is common in names of persons and places in many European regions where Germanic languages had ...
- 394
7
votes
Accepted
7
votes
Accepted
Wann heißt es „in <Staatsname>“ und wann „im <Staatsname>“?
Das hängt davon ab, wie der Staat als ganzes benutzt wird. Manche Staaten haben einen Artikel und sind damit einhergehend meistens keine Neutra. Die überwiegende Mehrzahl der Staaten der Erde wird ...
- 38.4k
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