Wanderwort
noun ·Rare ·Advanced level
Definitions
- 1 A loanword that has spread to many different languages, often through trade or the adoption of foreign cultural practices.
"Mrs. [Agnes Smith] Lewis has correctly observed that many corrections in the old papyri (things which no doubt the διορωτής corrected) were misinterpreted by the ancients (hence what [Adalbert] Merx calls "Wanderwörte")."
- 2 Alternative letter-case form of Wanderwort. alt-of
Synonyms
All synonymsExample
More examples"Mrs. [Agnes Smith] Lewis has correctly observed that many corrections in the old papyri (things which no doubt the διορωτής corrected) were misinterpreted by the ancients (hence what [Adalbert] Merx calls "Wanderwörte")."
Etymology
Unadapted borrowing from German Wanderwort, from wandern (“to wander”) + Wort (“word”). Wandern is ultimately derived from Proto-Indo-European *wendʰ- (“to turn, to wind”), and Wort from Proto-Indo-European *werh₁- (“to say, speak”). The plural forms Wanderworte and Wanderwörter are also borrowed from German Wanderworte and Wanderwörter.
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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.