beschweren

German

Etymology

From Middle High German beswæren (to afflict, to depress, to annoy), a merger from Old High German biswāren (to depress, to burden) (10th c.), from Proto-West Germanic *biswârijan; and Old High German biswārōn (to burden) (10th c.), from Proto-West Germanic *biswārōn. Related to swāren (heavy) (8th c.) whence schwer. The reflexive sense developed later in the 14th century from "to burden oneself", "to fret" to "to complain about something worrisome, burdensome".[1] Cognate with Dutch bezwaren.

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /bəˈʃveːʁən/
  • Audio:(file)
  • Hyphenation: be‧schwe‧ren
  • Rhymes: -eːʀən

Verb

beschweren (weak, third-person singular present beschwert, past tense beschwerte, past participle beschwert, auxiliary haben)

  1. (transitive) to weight, to weight down
  2. (reflexive) to complain [with über (+ accusative) ‘about someone/something’ or a subordinate clause]
    Synonym: beklagen

Conjugation

Derived terms

References

  1. ^ Wolfgang Pfeifer, editor (1993), “beschweren”, in Etymologisches Wörterbuch des Deutschen (in German), 2nd edition, Berlin: Akademie-Verlag, →ISBN

Further reading