Something I just learned.."What does 'AUDI' mean in German?"" Winner gets..
08-30-2002, 11:49 AM
#11
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Sorry, Jason, you're wrong....
Audi is not a german word, it's Latin. :P
Audi
The Audi car company (fnd'd. 1909) got its name from the imperative singular of audio (Latin for `I hear') because the founder, a German named August Horch, had sold the rights to his name along with his first car company (fnd'd. 1899). The use of a Latin calque was the man's son's suggestion. Perhaps it's a slight approximation or exaggeration to call it a calque. Oh, alright, it's not a calque -- audi is the Latin translation of German horch. [The German verbs hören (`to hear') and horchen (`to listen') are cognate with the English words hear and hearken. Needless to say, all are cognate with das Ohr, `ear.'] The semantic distance between horchen and hören is perhaps not so great as between listen and hear.]
Im Jahre 1932, Audi and Horch combined, along with Wanderer and DKW (Das kleine Wunder), into Auto-Union, adopting a logo in the form of four interlocking rings that is still the trademark of Audi. [Kleine Wunder can be literally translated `small wonder,' but the German expression only has the sense of `small miracle,' and does not suggest `no surprise [that]' like the English expression. Little wonder the company folded and was merged away.]
More details on Audi company history here.<ul><li><a href="https://www.audiworld.com/news/00/audihistory/content.shtml">history</a></li></ul>
Audi
The Audi car company (fnd'd. 1909) got its name from the imperative singular of audio (Latin for `I hear') because the founder, a German named August Horch, had sold the rights to his name along with his first car company (fnd'd. 1899). The use of a Latin calque was the man's son's suggestion. Perhaps it's a slight approximation or exaggeration to call it a calque. Oh, alright, it's not a calque -- audi is the Latin translation of German horch. [The German verbs hören (`to hear') and horchen (`to listen') are cognate with the English words hear and hearken. Needless to say, all are cognate with das Ohr, `ear.'] The semantic distance between horchen and hören is perhaps not so great as between listen and hear.]
Im Jahre 1932, Audi and Horch combined, along with Wanderer and DKW (Das kleine Wunder), into Auto-Union, adopting a logo in the form of four interlocking rings that is still the trademark of Audi. [Kleine Wunder can be literally translated `small wonder,' but the German expression only has the sense of `small miracle,' and does not suggest `no surprise [that]' like the English expression. Little wonder the company folded and was merged away.]
More details on Audi company history here.<ul><li><a href="https://www.audiworld.com/news/00/audihistory/content.shtml">history</a></li></ul>
08-30-2002, 12:06 PM
#12
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Actually it means nothing in German, it means "Listen" in Latin.
From the Audi history book I have at home.
August Horch's son came up with it. Horch means "Listen" in some language, possibly German. It's explained in the story in the book. August Horch lost the right to use his own name in a dispute with either Daimler or Benz or some other German car pioneer.
Can anyone back me up or straighten me out. I tend to get my knowledge from books and car forums.
August Horch's son came up with it. Horch means "Listen" in some language, possibly German. It's explained in the story in the book. August Horch lost the right to use his own name in a dispute with either Daimler or Benz or some other German car pioneer.
Can anyone back me up or straighten me out. I tend to get my knowledge from books and car forums.
08-30-2002, 12:48 PM
#16
He lost the rights to his name from his own company!
August Horch founded a company in 1899 named after himself. In 1909 after some dispute he left the company to form a new one. When he tried to use his own name for the new company the old company protested and he lost. The story is that at a meeting to come up with a new name Audi was suggested by the son of the man who was hosting the meeting, Franz Fikentscher.
This is from "A History of Progress"<ul><li><a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0837603846/qid%3D1030740409/sr%3D11-1/ref%3Dsr%5F11%5F1/102-8142636-9496106">http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0837603846/qid%3D1030740409/sr%3D11-1/ref%3Dsr%5F11%5F1/102-8142636-9496106</a
This is from "A History of Progress"<ul><li><a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0837603846/qid%3D1030740409/sr%3D11-1/ref%3Dsr%5F11%5F1/102-8142636-9496106">http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0837603846/qid%3D1030740409/sr%3D11-1/ref%3Dsr%5F11%5F1/102-8142636-9496106</a
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