Es scheint, dass wir einen Maulwurf in unserer Mitte haben.

I’m curious if there is any sort of logic behind the compound word here: “Maul” = mouth and “Wurf” = toss? It reminds me a bit of the word “Woodchuck” in English which is another seemingly meaningless compound word, as woodchucks neither have much to do with wood nor with chucking or tossing something, but rather, dig holes underground. “Groundhog” makes more sense. Is “Maulwurf” one of these sort of silly nonsense compound words like “Woodchuck”?

seems like it stems from something like ‘mound-thrower’ (ie. earth-thrower)

see mouldwarp - Wiktionary

1 Like