Wende

• IPA^(key): /ˈvɛndə/

• Audio:

  (file)

• Homophone: Wände
• Rhymes: -ɛndə
• Hyphenation: Wen‧de

From Middle High German wende, from Old High German wendī; see wenden. Cognate to Dutch wende.

Wende f (genitive Wende, plural Wenden)

1. turn (change in temperament or circumstance)
2. turnaround (reversal of policy)
3. (nautical) tacking
5. (with definite article, historical) the process that opened the way to the unification of West and East Germany; that period (1989–90) in general

• Jahrhundertwende
• Kehrtwende
• Nachwendezeit
• Sonnenwende
• Zeitenwende

From Middle High German winde, wint, from Old High German winid, from Proto-Germanic *winidaz ~ winiþaz. The form with -e- (15th c.) was influenced by Middle Low German went (re-shortened from earlier wēnt, *wēnet), from Old Saxon winoth, from the same Germanic source. The native form survives as Winde (“Slovene of Austria”, more commonly Windischer).

Wende m (weak, genitive Wenden, plural Wenden, feminine Wendin)

2. (regional or dated) Sorb, Wend, Lusatian Slav (a member of the native West Slavic-speaking population in parts of Saxony and Brandenburg; male or unspecified sex)

   Synonyms: Sorbe, Lausitzer Slawe/Wende

3. (still sometimes historical) a member or descendant (male or unspecified sex) of the Slavic tribes which had settled in those areas that were largely Germanized during the Middle Ages (eastern Germany, Pomerania, Lower Silesia, eastern Austria)

   Hyponyms: Elbslawe, Polabe, Pomorane, Slowinze, Sorbe

4. (archaic) a Slav in general (male or of unspecified sex)

   Synonym: Slawe

• Nowadays Sorbs in Brandenburg (speaking the almost extinct Lower Sorbian) commonly call themselves Wenden in German, whereas speakers in Saxony (Upper Sorbian) almost never use the term. This distinction is recent.

• wendisch
• Wendland