Piefke

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The word Piefke is a colloquial, mostly derogatory term in Austria for Germans with a corresponding language coloring . In Germany it is mostly a synonym for a braggart or a busybody, also for snob and "fine pee". Piefig, on the other hand, means petty bourgeois, stuffy.

use

The use and meaning of Piefke in Austria are comparable to the price common in old Bavaria for compatriots north of the so-called " white sausage equator ". In western Austria this term is used more than Piefke, although the southern Germans are mostly excluded from it. Both names belong to the group of ethnophaulisms ("pejorative foreign names for ethnic groups"). The term "Ösi", which is mainly used for Austrians in the north and east of Germany, as well as the title Haberer , which is common in Bavaria (especially to the Austrians with a Viennese / Eastern Austrian tongue), are a direct equivalent, as they are partially pejorative to the same extent, but can often also be used neutrally.

Word origin

The family name Piefke comes from the German East or the Slavic area . The old Polish family name Piwka, which is related to piwo ('beer'), is reproduced in a Latin Krakow document from 1390 with Pifka and in a German Lviv document from 1445 with Piwke . From this it is concluded that Piwka was Germanized by German East settlers and is the original form of Piefke .

Piefke was also used as the name of a joke figure in the 1840s. In 1882 Wilhelm Busch took up the term Plisch and Plum in this sense for his story . Mister Pief is what Busch calls the stiff and stupid Englishman who acquires the two dogs.

Its function as a symbol for the typical correct Prussia is likely to have the name, especially since the defeat of the German Confederation with Austria against Prussia in the German War of 1866. He owes this not least to the famous Prussian military musician Johann Gottfried Piefke , who composed the Königgrätzer March to celebrate the Prussian victory in the decisive battle and who was also present and conducted at the victory parade. During this time, the disrespectful nuance in Prussia was also fixed , comparable to the swede swede from the Thirty Years' War , which was two hundred years older .

There are at least two hypotheses about the coining of the term in today's sense, which, however, can be classified in the area of ​​folk legends and cannot be historically proven:

Joachim Schneider's hypothesis

Piefke memorial in Gänserndorf

On July 31, 1866, after the end of the Austro-Prussian War, a large parade with the 3rd, 4th and parts of the 2nd Army Corps in Marchfeld near Gänserndorf took place in front of King Wilhelm I of Prussia about 20 km from Vienna . In addition to Johann Gottfried Piefke - called "August" - his brother Rudolf (1835–1900) also conducted a music corps. The call “The Piefkes are coming” is said to have spread among the Viennese who hurried up and has become a symbol for 50,000 marching Prussians .

In September 2009 the world's only preserved Piefke memorial was erected in Gänserndorf in honor of Piefke. The city wants to rehabilitate the term “Piefke” with the “sound sculpture made of Corten steel ”, which is supposed to represent a record player.

Peter Wehle's hypothesis

Peter Wehle attributes the name “Piefke” to the storming of the Düppeler Schanzen in the German-Danish War . Prussians and Austrians were brothers in arms there. The military music director who accompanied the attack, Piefke, was a very "Prussian" Prussian who made such a lasting impression on his Austrian colleagues that his name became a symbol of the jagged and gruff Prussia.

Current developments

In the early 1990s , Felix Mitterer's Piefke saga , which was first broadcast on Austrian and later also on German television, attracted considerable attention on both sides of the national border and sparked heated discussions about the relationship between Germans and Austrians. The idea for the series came from a no less controversial article “Who needs the Piefkes?” In an Austrian weekly magazine.

See also

media

literature

  • Anton Karl Mally: Why are the Germans called "Piefke (s)" by Austrians? In: Der Sprachdienst , Volume 54, Issue 5, 2010, pp. 147–157.
  • Hubertus Godeysen: Piefke. Cultural history of abuse , Vienna-Klosterneuburg, 2010.
  • Piefke out! German students in Vienna. In: Der Spiegel. Online April 29, 2010 ( spiegel.de ).

Web links

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

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Otto Back et al .: Austrian dictionary - based on the official set of rules (new spelling) , ed. on behalf of the Federal Ministry for Education, Science and Culture; Editor: Herbert Fussy et al., 41st, revised edition. öbv hpt Verlagsg., 2009, p. 494.
  2. ↑ Duden - The German spelling. The comprehensive standard work based on the new official spelling rules. Edited by the Duden editorial team. Bibliographisches Institut & FA Brockhaus AG, Mannheim (inter alia) 2009, p. 834.
  3. ↑ Like Pifky or Pifkowski ; Hans Bahlow: German name dictionary.
  4. ^ Anton Karl Mally: Piefke. Supplements. In: mother tongue. Journal for the maintenance and research of the German language. Volume 94, Jg. 1983/84, 3-4, Wiesbaden, April 1984, pp. 313-327, here: pp. 314 f.
  5. ^ Konrad Kunze : dtv-Atlas onenology. 1998, p. 170: The name is also associated with beer here.
  6. ^ Kunze: dtv-Atlas onenology. 1998, p. 181.
  7. ^ Peter Wehle: The Viennese crooks language. 1977, p. 79; Peter Wehle: Do you speak Viennese? 1980, p. 27.