Knork

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Knorke is a colloquial word and means something like “good”, “excellent”, “satisfied”, similar to today's use of cool .

etymology

The etymological origin of the word is unclear. It may be related to the term knocke , which is supposed to mean "a handful (and satisfied with it)". The word has been recorded in Berlin since 1916 and quickly became a popular buzzword , also in newspaper journalism , in cabaret (e.g. Claire Waldoff , who is also referred to in some sources as the creator of the word) and in art (e.g. Heinrich Zille ) and literature (e.g. Alfred Döblin , Erich Kästner ). According to Kurt Tucholsky , it was already out of date in autumn 1924; Since then, however, it has enjoyed increasing popularity in phases.

Berlin-born German scholar Agathe Lasch explains how “knorke” came about in 1928: “It only appeared in the last few years, after the label 'Knorkes Buletten are the best', with which a dealer or Budiker in the large factory district in the north sells his goods touted. 'Knorke' was jokingly identified with 'the best' in a genuinely Berlin witty word relation; Knorke spread quickly in the factories where Knorkes Schild was known, from there it spread further. "

Knorke has also been part of the language used by young people in northern Germany since the 1930s. Former Chancellor Helmut Schmidt , born and raised in Hamburg, spoke on a program with Sandra Maischberger in 2010 about words from his childhood - including "knorke". In a radio interview with WDR 5 in October 2011, he expressed his suspicion that the term could have become popular thanks to a popular hippopotamus in the Berlin zoo called "Knorke". However, the former chancellor is wrong. The famous Berlin hippopotamus was called Knautschke . Around 1956/57 the Berlin clothing company Leineweber gave the Berlin Zoo a gorilla and advertised a competition among Berlin schoolchildren to find a name for the animal. The winning name was Knorke; This was justified with the word meaning "great", "great".

Today Knorke is known far beyond the Berlin-speaking area .

The rock band Knorkator changed the word and made it their band name.

See also

literature

  • Christoph Gutknecht : All blooming nonsense: Amazing word stories from madness to wishy-washy . C. H. Beck, Hamburg 2001 (3rd edition), ISBN 3406475574 , pp. 157 & 158.
  • Agathe Lasch: "Berlinisch". A Berlin linguistic history . Hobbing, Berlin [1928] (=  Berlinische Forschungen. Volume 2), p. 204.
  • Hans Meyer, Walther Kiaulehn , Siegfried Mauermann: The right Berliner in words and phrases . C. H. Beck, Hamburg 2000, ISBN 3406459889 , pp. 31, 32, 90 & 125.

Web links

Wiktionary: knorke  - explanations of meanings, word origins, synonyms, translations

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Adolf Storfer: Words and their fates. Atlantis, Berlin, Zurich 1935, p. 215 ff.
  2. ↑ Kurt Tucholsky: The Knorke case. In: Vossische Zeitung, October 7, 1924 .
  3. ↑ Agathe Lasch: "Berlinisch". A Berlin linguistic history . Hobbing, Berlin [1928] (=  Berlinische Forschungen. Volume 2), p. 204, where it goes on to say: “I have not yet succeeded in determining whether the process really happened as it is reported. [...] - Increasing further training: noble knork, full knork; knorke mit'n kink is only half successful. "
  4. ^ WDR 5 table talk with Gabriele Gillen, audible as a podcast ( memento from October 7, 2011 in the Internet Archive ).