{"id":5321,"date":"2014-08-09T08:24:55","date_gmt":"2014-08-09T08:24:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/?p=5321"},"modified":"2017-11-16T10:31:36","modified_gmt":"2017-11-16T10:31:36","slug":"essen-vs-sein","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/essen-vs-sein\/","title":{"rendered":"Essen vs sein"},"content":{"rendered":"

The verbs essen <\/em>and sein <\/em>do not seem to conflict, but sometimes they do phonetically. This happens in the pronouns er\/sie\/es<\/em>.<\/p>\n

you eat \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0you are<\/p>\n

er\/sie\/es isst \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0er\/sie\/es ist<\/em><\/p>\n

he\/she\/it eats\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 he\/she\/it is<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

As you can see, isst <\/em>and ist <\/em>sound the same! Also, in every day speech, the -t <\/em>mutes sometimes. This only happens for ist, <\/em>though! It is used much more, of course, and therefore everybody understands is <\/em>just as much as ist<\/em> in a sentence. An example:<\/p>\n

Komm’ schon, Es ist doch nicht so schwer!<\/em><\/p>\n

Come on, it isn’t that hard!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Now you might think: but\u00a0iss\u00a0<\/em>is the imperative of\u00a0essen<\/em>! And you are right. But that imperative is not used as frequently as\u00a0ist,\u00a0<\/em>and its place in a sentence is different – so there is no conflict here between the pronunciation of iss\u00a0<\/i>and ist.<\/i><\/p>\n

Anyhow, let’s look at the origin! Why is it not er\/sie\/es esst? <\/em>The secret is called e-i-Wechsel<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Both German and Latin come from the Indo-European family. In Latin,\u00a0to be is\u00a0esse<\/em>. There were no personal pronouns in Latin. You could figure it out by the ending of the verb. With\u00a0esse<\/em>, that looks like this:<\/p>\n

sum\u00a0<\/em>(I am)<\/p>\n

es\u00a0<\/em>(you are – singular)<\/p>\n

est\u00a0<\/em>(he\/she\/it is)<\/p>\n

sumus\u00a0<\/em>(we are)<\/p>\n

estis\u00a0<\/em>(you are – plural)<\/p>\n

sunt\u00a0<\/em>(they are)<\/p>\n

As you can see,\u00a0est\u00a0<\/em>looks much like\u00a0ist<\/em>. From Indogermanic, the\u00a0e\u00a0<\/em>transformed into an\u00a0i<\/em> in certain cases. A short\u00a0e\u00a0<\/em>in the infinitive of a verb, such as essen<\/em>, becomes an\u00a0i\u00a0<\/em>in the du<\/em> and er\/sie\/es<\/em> conjugations. For a long\u00a0e,\u00a0<\/em>this becomes an\u00a0ie\u00a0<\/em>in those conjugations. Examples:<\/p>\n

essen<\/em><\/p>\n

du\u00a0<\/em>i<\/em><\/strong>sst<\/em><\/p>\n

er\/sie\/es\u00a0i<\/strong>sst<\/em><\/p>\n

lesen<\/em><\/p>\n

du lie<\/strong>st<\/em><\/p>\n

er\/sie\/es lie<\/strong>st<\/em><\/p>\n

This also happened to the very irregular\u00a0sein<\/em>.\u00a0est\u00a0<\/em>became\u00a0ist,\u00a0<\/em>because it was a short\u00a0e.<\/em>\u00a0Why this changed is not clear, but I assume it changed because\u00a0ist\u00a0<\/em>became easier to pronounce and seemed more logical after the\u00a0e-i-Wechsel<\/em>.<\/p>\n

PS: heed the two exceptions nehmen\u00a0<\/i>and\u00a0geben<\/em>. Even though both have a long\u00a0e<\/em>, they change. Nehmen\u00a0<\/i>becomes\u00a0du nimmst<\/strong>\u00a0<\/em>and\u00a0er\/sie\/es nimmt.<\/strong><\/em>\u00a0<\/strong>Geben\u00a0<\/em>becomes\u00a0du gibst<\/strong><\/em>\u00a0<\/strong>and\u00a0er\/sie\/es<\/em>\u00a0gibt<\/strong>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\"\"

The verbs essen and sein do not seem to conflict, but sometimes they do phonetically. This happens in the pronouns er\/sie\/es. you eat \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0…<\/p>\n

Continue Reading<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":110,"featured_media":7495,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[95066,9088],"class_list":["post-5321","post","type-post","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-language","tag-history-2","tag-phonetics"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t