Sleepy little one

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Schlafittchen or incorrectly Schlawittchen ( diminutive , formerly dative plural of sleeping parakeet , "flapping wing"), also Schlafittl , is a widespread and apparently quite old name for shirt or jacket collars or skirt or sleeve tips.

Phrase

The word is used in the context of the phrase “grabbing the sleeping bag” in the sense of “preventing someone from running away”, similar to how one grabs poultry by the base of their wings. In Low German, poultry or wing is also referred to as Fittgen . In Heinsius ' Sprach- und Sittenanzeiger der Deutschen from 1817 there is the following detailed explanation of the idiom (p. 96): “This idiom is commonly used with the following: Taking someone prisoner, as synonymous. The Schlafittgen is completely German. It was created from Schlagfittig. But under the impact fit one understands the strong fit of the birds. If you only have the bird when you are ready to hit it, your freedom has come to an end. If you have a person under your control, as it were, like the bird, whose flap you are caught, then he is also as well captured as the bird. "As early as 1800, however, the essence of this declaration appeared almost word-for-word in a Wroclaw magazine: 

 Schlafittgen (Zur Beantwortung einer Anfrage.)
 Schlafittgen, einen bey dem Schlafittgen kriegen, ist weder blos Schlesisch, noch auch aus dem Slavischen abzuleiten, sondern ganz deutsch.
 Es ist nämlich aus Schlafittig (dem starken Flügel) zusammengezogen; wenn man einen Vogel bey seinem Schlagfittig hat, so ist er gefangen.

In the dictionary of idioms and proverbial idioms , this idiom is described as "taking someone to account and holding them accountable", whereby the offense is viewed as rather minor.

As an explanation, it is also given that this expression means grabbing someone by the shirt or jacket collar or " reading someone the riot act ".

swell

  1. ^ Richard Pekrun: The German word. Spelling and explanation of the German vocabulary and foreign words . Georg Dollheimer, Leipzig 1933, p. 860 .
  2. ↑ Horst Klien (ed.): Der Große Duden, dictionary and guide to German spelling . 16th edition. Bibliographisches Institut, Leipzig 1969, p. 412 .
  3. ^ Theodor Heinsius: Sprach- und Sittenanzeiger der Deutschen , Berlin 1817, p. 96
  4. ↑ The Wroclaw Narrator. Eine Wochenschrift , Volume 1, No. 37 of Sept. 13, 1800, p. 600
  5. ↑ Duden. 11, 1992, p. 622.
  6. ^ Hermann Frischbier : Prussian dictionary. East and West Prussian provincialisms in alphabetical order. Enslin, Berlin 1883, Volume 2, p. 279: "Hold him by the tip of his skirt, sleeve, etc.".
  7. ↑ 1000 German idioms. With explanations and application examples. Langenscheidt, Berlin 1981, ISBN 3-468-43112-0 , p. 178: “ catch someone, reprimand someone”.

Web links

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

literature