stoßen

German

Alternative forms

• stossen (Switzerland and Liechtenstein)

Etymology

From Middle High German stōzen, from Old High German stōzan, from Proto-West Germanic *stautan, from Proto-Germanic *stautaną, from Proto-Indo-European *stówd-e-ti, an o-grade intensive formation from *(s)tewd- (“to hit, push”).

Akin to Old Norse stauta and steyta (whence Danish støde), Gothic 𐍃𐍄𐌰𐌿𐍄𐌰𐌽 (stautan). Non-Germanic cognates include Latin tundo. Compare Sanskrit तुदति (tudáti, “to strike, goad”), तोद (todá, “driver, impeller”). Related to Dutch stoten (“to push, bump”) and dialectal English stot (“to bounce, rebound, ricochet, or make bounce, rebound or ricochet”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈʃtoːsən/

• Audio

  (file)

Verb

stoßen (class 7 strong, third-person singular present stößt, past tense stieß, past participle gestoßen, auxiliary haben or sein)

1. (transitive) to push; to shove; to thrust
2. (transitive or reflexive) to bump; to knock; to strike; to hurt
3. (reflexive, figuratively) to take exception (to something)
4. (intransitive) to jolt; to kick; to thrust
5. (intransitive) to bump (into something); to knock (against something) or
6. (intransitive) to come (across something); to happen (upon something); to stumble (upon something)

   auf Probleme stoßen ― to run into problems

7. (transitive, vulgar) to fuck
   • 1969, Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Katzelmacher:

     PAUL Mir auch. Eine gute Magd ist sie, das muss man ihr lassen. Hast sie schon gestoßen?

     (please add an English translation of this quotation)

Conjugation

Derived terms

Further reading

• “stoßen” in Digitales Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache
• “stoßen” in Uni Leipzig: Wortschatz-Lexikon
• “stoßen” in Duden online
• “stoßen” in OpenThesaurus.de
• Friedrich Kluge (1883) “stoßen”, in John Francis Davis, transl., Etymological Dictionary of the German Language, published 1891