töten

See also: Töten, toten, and Toten

German

Alternative forms

  • tödten (obsolete, predominant until 1900), töden (until 18th c.)

Etymology

From Middle High German tœten, tœden, from Old High German *tōten, tōden, from Proto-West Germanic *daudijan ~ *dauþijan. By surface analysis, tot (dead) +‎ -en.

Cognate with Dutch doden, Old Norse deyða, Gothic 𐌳𐌰𐌿𐌸𐌾𐌰𐌽 (dauþjan). Compare also English deaden.

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /ˈtøːtən/, [ˈtøː.tn̩]
  • Audio:(file)
  • Audio:(file)
  • Hyphenation: tö‧ten

Verb

töten (weak, third-person singular present tötet, past tense tötete, past participle getötet, auxiliary haben)

  1. (transitive) to kill
    Zehn Menschen wurden bei dem Anschlag getötet.
    Ten people were killed in the attack.

Usage notes

  • In formal style, töten is an adequate translation of English “to kill” in its literal meaning. Colloquially, the verb umbringen is preferred and töten is rare. In particular, only umbringen is generally used in figurative senses. For example: Ich bring meinen Freund um, wenn er meine Blumen nicht gegossen hat! (I'll kill my boyfriend if he hasn't watered my flowers!).

Conjugation

Derived terms

See also

Further reading

  • töten” in Digitales Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache
  • töten” in Uni Leipzig: Wortschatz-Lexikon
  • töten” in Duden online
  • töten” in OpenThesaurus.de

Tatar

Noun

töten

  1. smoke