Though Rindfleischetikettierungsueberwachungsaufgabenuebertragungsgesetz was considered an official word, it never entered the dictionary. This, one hopes, is reassuring to people who have a fear of long words, or

Rindfleischetikettierungsueberwachungsaufgabenuebertragungsgesetz became RkReÜAÜG, for example. To make such words more manageable, they’re often abbreviated. The language’s lengthy compound nouns have, inevitably, acquired their own compound noun: They are known as bandwurmwörter, or “tapeworm words.” Mark Twain, a student of German, called such words “alphabetical processions,” the LA Times reports. Sometimes, however, this system gets out of control. For example, Germans say platzangst – literally, space fear - rather than the borrowed Greek of “claustrophobia,” or the word dreirad – three wheel - when an English speaker would say “tricycle.” At its best, that brings a degree of simplicity to the language. In German, complex ideas are frequently captured by bolting together short nouns. But a local parliament decided to repeal the law, making Rindfleischetikettierungsueberwachungsaufgabenuebertragungsgesetz obsolete, the Los Angeles Times reports. The longest word in the German language-the 63-letter-long Rindfleischetikettierungsueberwachungsaufgabenuebertragungsgesetz-was created to represent a law about beef regulation. There is a long list of long German words. Sometimes, they even show up in the real world.

Borrowed german words in english