schwanen

Sometimes taken as a loan from Middle Low German, but first attestations are nearly contemporaneous (1514 for Low German, 1543 for High German, according to Grimm). Semantic derivation disputed. The Duden dictionary suspects a learned jocular translation from Latin olet mihi (“I smell [something]”) (with dative construction as in German), due to phonetic similarity of Latin olēre (“to smell”) and olor (“swan”). Grimm however, because of the early and near-contemporaneous attestations in different regions, sees it as an inherited word of the common people, connecting it to the traditional Germanic association of swans with prophecy and fate (cf. the Norns) and pointing to the synonymous expression Schwansfedern haben/tragen (literally “to have/wear swan's feathers”). Earlier variants contain -d- (schwanden, Low German swanden), probably under influence of ahnden, a once common variant of ahnen (“to anticipate, to suspect”).^[1][2]

• IPA^(key): /ˈʃvaːnən/

• Audio:

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schwanen (weak, third-person singular present schwant, past tense schwante, past participle geschwant, auxiliary haben)

1. (colloquial) to anticipate (something bad), to suspect, to dread

   Synonyms: ahnen, befürchten

   Mir schwant nichts Gutes.

   I sense something bad coming up.

   (literally, “I anticipate nothing good.”)

   • 2014, Paul Grossman, Schattenmann: Kriminalroman, Aufbau Digital, →ISBN:

     Ihm schwante Übles bei seinem bevorstehenden Besuch im Polizeihauptquartier. Aber diesmal nicht aus den üblichen Gründen. Dieser eine Messerstich hatte ihm nicht nur einen Freund genommen, sondern auch gleich beide Stellungen.

     (please add an English translation of this quotation)

• “schwanen” in Digitales Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache
• “schwanen” in Uni Leipzig: Wortschatz-Lexikon
• “schwanen” in Duden online