Questions about German Thread

[Imralu]

Edit: Since L&L isn't pruned very much (if at all) and since there are a few of us on the board who are trying to improve our German, I thought I might open this thread up to anyone who wants to ask questions about German grammar, vocab, pronunciation etc.

Original message follows:
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

During discussions in the fluency thread, I realised I have a bit of a gap in my knowledge of German grammar. I know how to form all the verb forms, and I guess I haven't given it much further thought because German verbs don't divide up time into such anally precise distinctions as English does. Aside from lack of progressive forms and a barely and inconsistently preserved difference in meaning between Präteritum and Perfekt, the main difference I had noticed is that Präsens is used for actions and states that began in the past but are not yet finished, whereas English uses present perfect simple or continuous.

Ich kenne ihn seit Jahren. = I've known him for years.
Ich arbeite schon lange hier. = I've been working here for a long time.

My first little question is, are Perfekt and/or Präteritum used as the equivalents of English past perfect simple/continuous? I'll colour-code what I think are the more formally written sentences and more common spoken sentences.

Als sie sich heirateten, kannten sie sich nur seit sechs Monaten.
Als sie sich geheiratet haben, haben sie sich nur seit sechs Monaten gekannt.
Eng. = When they got married, they'd only known each other for six months.

Als er zum Chef befördert wurde, arbeitete er schon bei der Firma seit 16 Jahren.
Als er zum Chef befördert wurde, hat er schon bei der Firma seit 16 Jahren gearbeitet.
Eng. = When he was made boss, he had (already) been working at the company for 16 years.

All correct?

I've also noticed times when Plusquamperfekt is used where past perfect wouldn't be used in English. I can't think of any examples, but I'm not too concerned about that because my own feeling for when to use it has been confirmed as correct enough times to know that I've probably implicitly learned to use it in these situations.

Here's the bit that threw me off ...

Ich habe ihn dann direkt gefragt, ob er mir ein Antibiotikum verschrieben hatte*

* One would use the Plusquamperfect e.g. if you were asking about a prescription you received during a previous visit.

Original words
What would I ask the doctor at the time, just after he has handed me the prescription and I'm holding it in my hands, unable to read it? In English, I'd say "What have you prescribed me?" - present perfect simple - because the action (prescribing) is finished but still has bearing on the present (I'm holding it). Which of the following would a German speaker say?

(1) Was haben Sie mir verschrieben?
(2) Was verschreiben Sie mir?

I'm tentatively guessing (1) because the action of prescribing (at least as English defines it) is finished, and that (2) would be used while the doctor is writing (or even before), equivalent to English "What are you prescribing/going to prescribe me?".

Reported Speech
Talking about this situation later, I would say "I asked him what he had prescribed me." I've used the tense backshift here because the prescribing happened before the asking, which is usual in indirect speech. I've since found out that German doesn't do a tense shift. I know that in formal, written German, the subjunctive is used, but that it's not generally used in Umgangsprache, but I didn't know the tense was usually left alone when subjunctive wasn't used.

Ich fragte den Arzt, was er mir verschrieben habe.
Ich habe den Arzt gefragt, was er mir verschrieben hat.

Correct?

Embedded questions
Now, I think I get this much (as long as the above is correct), but it's opened up some more questions in my head. What if it's not any form of reported speech but something more like reported thought. What's correct in this situation out of the following?

(1) Ich wusste nicht, was mir der Arzt verschrieben hatte.
(2) Ich wusste nicht, was mir der Arzt verschrieben hat.
Eng. = "I didn't know what the doctor had prescribed me."

I'm going to guess (1) is correct, but then I have been using indirekte Rede incorrectly with a tense backshift for years, so I don't know how much I can trust my own intuition on this one. It's also very hard to find good sources for the more advanced aspects of German grammar. Most books and websites spend a huge amount of time going through the gender and case system with nouns, determiners and adjectives, which prepositions require which case in which situation and then the verb conjugation and word order, but they don't spend much time on much else, so once you know all the declention and conjugation stuff, and you've got the word order down pat, it's hard to find anything that can help with other little bits of grammar.

Reporting speech from long ago
All the online learning aids I've found that deal with indirekte Rede seem only to use situations where the original sentence was in Präsens, Perfekt or Futur I (ie. verb forms where the finite verb is in Präsens), which is easy enough, although I would just like to confirm that no backshift occurs in something which is definitely only possible in the past, for example, when someone is dead.

"Ich habe Hunger. = "I'm hungry."
(1) An einem warmen, sonnigen Sonntag im Jahrgang 1965 sagte Elvis Presley, er habe Hunger.
(2) An einem warmen, sonnigen Sonntag im Jahrgang 1965 sagte Elvis Presley, dass er Hunger habe.
(3) An einem warmen, sonnigen Sonntag im Jahr 1965 hat Elvis Presley gesagt, dass er Hunger hat.
(4) An einem warmen, sonnigen Sonntag im Jahr 1965 hat Elvis Presley gesagt, er hat Hunger .

Correct? (I have a feeling that (4) is a bit weird or wrong, and I really want to say hatte in (3) and (4))

Reported Speech in other tenses
What about reporting speech where the finite verb of the original sentence was not in Präsens?

"Gestern war ich hier". = "Yesterday I was here."
Sie sagte, sie wäre am vorigen Tag da.
Sie hat gesagt, dass sie am vorigen Tag da war.
Eng. = "She said she had been there the day before."

"Ich konnte Klavier spielen, als ich fünf war. = "I could play the piano when I was five.
Sie erzählte mir, sie könnte Klavier spielen, als sie fünf war.
Sie hat mir erzählt, dass sie Klavier spielen konnte, als sie fünf war.

"Ich hatte das schon gesehen, bevor du es mir gezeigt hast." = "I'd seen that before you showed it to me."
Er sagte, er hätte das schon gesehen, bevor ich es ihm gezeigt habe.
Er hat mir gesagt, dass er das schon gesehen hatte, bevor ich es ihm gezeigt habe.
Eng. = "He told me (that) he had seen that before I (had) showed it to him."

Correct?

I feel that the bevor and als clauses won't be changed because they're not part of the potentially dubious claim. Like, you wouldn't say "She could allegedly play the piano when she was allegedly five" or "He had allegedly already seen it before I allegedly showed it to him," because, obviously, she was five at some point, and I did really show him. Those are not the things that they are claiming. Is that at all how this works??

Slipperly slope of tense, time and place
Assuming the original sentence is being reported at a much later date and in a different place, in English we have to change time and place dependent phrases such as "yesterday" and "here" to "the day before" and "there". I feel like it has to be done in German too, but then if tense doesn't need to be changed, in my head, it puts it all on a slippery slope. If you don't change tense, why change time expressions? And if time expressions don't need to be changed, why change place expressions? And if place expressions don't need to be changed, why change grammatical person? I'll illustrate the slope of changes.

"Ich habe gestern nichts gegessen, weil ich den ganzen Tag hier in meinem Bett geblieben bin."

(1) Er hat vor ein paar Wochen gesagt; "Ich habe gestern nichts gegessen, weil ich den ganzen Tag hier in meinem Bett geblieben bin."
- nothing changed - direct speech

(2) Er hat vor ein paar Wochen gesagt, dass ich gestern nichts gegessen habe, weil ich den ganzen Tag hier in meinem Bett geblieben bin.
- quotation subordinated - grammatical person, place, time and tense all relate to perspective of the speaker of the original text - misleading!

(3) Er hat vor ein paar Wochen gesagt, dass er gestern nichts gegessen hat, weil er den ganzen Tag hier in seinem Bett geblieben ist.
- grammatical person changed to relate to the perspective of the reporter - place, time and tense all relate to perspective of the original speech act

(4) Er hat vor ein paar Wochen gesagt, dass er gestern nichts gegessen hat, weil er den ganzen Tag da in seinem Bett geblieben ist.
- place phrase changed to relate to the perspective of the reporter - time and tense still relate to the perspective of the original speech act

(5) Er hat vor ein paar Wochen gesagt, dass er am vorigen Tag nichts gegessen hat, weil er den ganzen Tag da in seinem Bett geblieben ist.
- time phrase changed to relate to the perspective of the reporter - tense left in relation to the perspective of the original speech act

(6) Er hat vor ein paar Wochen gesagt, dass er am vorigen Tag nichts gegessen hatte, weil er den ganzen Tag da in seinem Bett geblieben war.
- everything, including tense, changed to relate to the perspective of the reporter rather than the original speech act

I'm guessing that, in German, (1) and (5) (or maybe (4)?) are allowable and the others are not ... but to me, (5) seems like kind of a funny place to stop. This is bothering only because I'm not exactly sure where to stop. If I don't change tense back, what do I have to change? Which, if any, is a correct way to report the sentence at the top of the quote box?

Thank you for your patience!

[Cedh]

My first little question is, are Perfekt and/or Präteritum used as the equivalents of English past perfect simple/continuous? I'll colour-code what I think are the more formally written sentences and more common spoken sentences.

Als sie sich heirateten, kannten sie sich nur seit sechs Monaten.
Als sie sich geheiratet haben, haben sie sich nur seit sechs Monaten gekannt.
Eng. = When they got married, they'd only known each other for six months.

Als er zum Chef befördert wurde, arbeitete er schon bei der Firma seit 16 Jahren.
Als er zum Chef befördert wurde, hat er schon bei der Firma seit 16 Jahren gearbeitet.
Eng. = When he was made boss, he had (already) been working at the company for 16 years.

All correct?

Yes, except that "heiraten" is not usually used reflexively, that "only" with reference to a past tense duration is more naturally translated as "erst", and that adverbial attributes are usually ordered time-before-place. Here's how I would say/write these sentences myself:

Als sie heirateten, kannten sie sich erst seit sechs Monaten.
Als sie geheiratet haben, haben sie sich erst seit sechs Monaten gekannt.
Eng. = When they got married, they'd only known each other for six months.

Als er zum Chef befördert wurde, arbeitete er schon seit 16 Jahren bei der Firma.
Als er zum Chef befördert wurde, hat er schon seit 16 Jahren bei der Firma gearbeitet.
Eng. = When he was made boss, he had (already) been working at the company for 16 years.

Original words
What would I ask the doctor at the time, just after he has handed me the prescription and I'm holding it in my hands, unable to read it? In English, I'd say "What have you prescribed me?" - present perfect simple - because the action (prescribing) is finished but still has bearing on the present (I'm holding it). Which of the following would a German speaker say?

(1) Was haben Sie mir verschrieben?
(2) Was verschreiben Sie mir?

I'm tentatively guessing (1) because the action of prescribing (at least as English defines it) is finished, and that (2) would be used while the doctor is writing (or even before), equivalent to English "What are you prescribing/going to prescribe me?".

What you're guessing is partly correct - it's the reason why you can't use (1) while the doctor is still writing. However, when he has finished writing but you haven't yet left the room, both sentences can be used interchangeably, and I think I'd actually prefer to use (2), because the situation in which the doctor is prescribing something is not yet over. If you called the doctor on the phone an hour later though, you'd have to use (1).

Reported Speech
Talking about this situation later, I would say "I asked him what he had prescribed me." I've used the tense backshift here because the prescribing happened before the asking, which is usual in indirect speech. I've since found out that German doesn't do a tense shift. I know that in formal, written German, the subjunctive is used, but that it's not generally used in Umgangsprache, but I didn't know the tense was usually left alone when subjunctive wasn't used.

Ich fragte den Arzt, was er mir verschrieben habe.
Ich habe den Arzt gefragt, was er mir verschrieben hat.

Correct?

Almost. The "spoken" sentence is very natural, but in the "written" sentence the subjunctive sounds very old-fashioned even in formal writing (except maybe if you were writing it in a novel, from the point of view of someone saying/writing this at the beginning of the 20th century), so I think I'd use Ich fragte den Arzt, was er mir verschrieben hatte as the written variant.

Embedded questions
Now, I think I get this much (as long as the above is correct), but it's opened up some more questions in my head. What if it's not any form of reported speech but something more like reported thought. What's correct in this situation out of the following?

(1) Ich wusste nicht, was mir der Arzt verschrieben hatte.
(2) Ich wusste nicht, was mir der Arzt verschrieben hat.
Eng. = "I didn't know what the doctor had prescribed me."

I would use (1) in writing, and Ich habe nicht gewusst, was der Arzt mir verschrieben hat in speech. Using the Plusquamperfekt in speech is also possible; the latter would indicate that a fairly long time has passed since the prescription, and that you're looking back not just on the prescription, but also on the situation in which your missing knowledge of the prescription was relevant.

Reporting speech from long ago
All the online learning aids I've found that deal with indirekte Rede seem only to use situations where the original sentence was in Präsens, Perfekt or Futur I (ie. verb forms where the finite verb is in Präsens), which is easy enough, although I would just like to confirm that no backshift occurs in something which is definitely only possible in the past, for example, when someone is dead.

"Ich habe Hunger. = "I'm hungry."
(1) An einem warmen, sonnigen Sonntag im Jahrgang 1965 sagte Elvis Presley, er habe Hunger.
(2) An einem warmen, sonnigen Sonntag im Jahrgang 1965 sagte Elvis Presley, dass er Hunger habe.
(3) An einem warmen, sonnigen Sonntag im Jahr 1965 hat Elvis Presley gesagt, dass er Hunger hat.
(4) An einem warmen, sonnigen Sonntag im Jahr 1965 hat Elvis Presley gesagt, er hat Hunger .

Correct? (I have a feeling that (4) is a bit weird or wrong, and I really want to say hatte in (3) and (4))

(1) and (2) are correct, if a bit old-fashioned. (2) with hatte would be more natural in writing today. (3) is grammatically questionable and (4) is colloquial; the best option for both of these would indeed be An einem warmen, sonnigen Sonntag im Jahr 1965 hat Elvis Presley gesagt, dass er Hunger hatte.

Reported Speech in other tenses
What about reporting speech where the finite verb of the original sentence was not in Präsens?

"Gestern war ich hier". = "Yesterday I was here."
Sie sagte, sie wäre am vorigen Tag da.
Sie hat gesagt, dass sie am vorigen Tag da war.
Eng. = "She said she had been there the day before."

"Ich konnte Klavier spielen, als ich fünf war. = "I could play the piano when I was five.
Sie erzählte mir, sie könnte Klavier spielen, als sie fünf war.
Sie hat mir erzählt, dass sie Klavier spielen konnte, als sie fünf war.

"Ich hatte das schon gesehen, bevor du es mir gezeigt hast." = "I'd seen that before you showed it to me."
Er sagte, er hätte das schon gesehen, bevor ich es ihm gezeigt habe.
Er hat mir gesagt, dass er das schon gesehen hatte, bevor ich es ihm gezeigt habe.
Eng. = "He told me (that) he had seen that before I (had) showed it to him."

Correct?

Yes.

Some of the "written" sentences are a bit tricky though:
- Sie erzählte mir, sie könnte Klavier spielen, als sie fünf war sounds as if she told me this when she was five. If you want to get the reading "she told me (when she was older) that she could play the piano when she was five", it would be better to use konnte.
- Er sagte, er hätte das schon gesehen, bevor ich es ihm gezeigt habe similarly feels better with hatte. Also, in higher-register written text ... bevor ich es ihm zeigte might be more likely to be found.

Slipperly slope of tense, time and place

"Ich habe gestern nichts gegessen, weil ich den ganzen Tag hier in meinem Bett geblieben bin."

(1) Er hat vor ein paar Wochen gesagt; "Ich habe gestern nichts gegessen, weil ich den ganzen Tag hier in meinem Bett geblieben bin."
- nothing changed - direct speech

(2) Er hat vor ein paar Wochen gesagt, dass ich gestern nichts gegessen habe, weil ich den ganzen Tag hier in meinem Bett geblieben bin.
- quotation subordinated - grammatical person, place, time and tense all relate to perspective of the speaker of the original text - misleading!

(3) Er hat vor ein paar Wochen gesagt, dass er gestern nichts gegessen hat, weil er den ganzen Tag hier in seinem Bett geblieben ist.
- grammatical person changed to relate to the perspective of the reporter - place, time and tense all relate to perspective of the original speech act

(4) Er hat vor ein paar Wochen gesagt, dass er gestern nichts gegessen hat, weil er den ganzen Tag da in seinem Bett geblieben ist.
- place phrase changed to relate to the perspective of the reporter - time and tense still relate to the perspective of the original speech act

(5) Er hat vor ein paar Wochen gesagt, dass er am vorigen Tag nichts gegessen hat, weil er den ganzen Tag da in seinem Bett geblieben ist.
- time phrase changed to relate to the perspective of the reporter - tense left in relation to the perspective of the original speech act

(6) Er hat vor ein paar Wochen gesagt, dass er am vorigen Tag nichts gegessen hatte, weil er den ganzen Tag da in seinem Bett geblieben war.
- everything, including tense, changed to relate to the perspective of the reporter rather than the original speech act

I'm guessing that, in German, (1) and (5) (or maybe (4)?) are allowable and the others are not ... but to me, (5) seems like kind of a funny place to stop. This is bothering only because I'm not exactly sure where to stop. If I don't change tense back, what do I have to change? Which, if any, is a correct way to report the sentence at the top of the quote box?

(1), (4), (5), and (6) are all acceptable.
(4) is fairly colloquial, but it works at least in informal speech, and when writing about informal speech too. (5) sounds a bit strange, but that's only because the Perfekt suggests an informal style, but the informal way to say "the day before" would be am Tag vorher rather than am vorigen Tag. (6) would be preferred in written German, but this kind of tense backshift can in fact also be used in informal speech to emphasize that the reported event happened fairly long ago.

It seems to me as if tense backshift, which according to your sources should not happen, is currently gaining ground in German - possibly due to influence from English, but more likely as part of a general replacement of the Konjunktiv forms of auxiliary verbs with their respective Präteritum forms. (For most other verbs in spoken German, the Konjunktiv isn't used any longer anyway, and the Präteritum is more or less dead too except in imperfective background subclauses.)

[Imralu]

Thanks Cedh!

Yes, except that "heiraten" is not usually used reflexively, that "only" with reference to a past tense duration is more naturally translated as "erst", and that adverbial attributes are usually ordered time-before-place.

*Kicks self* - If I had read it out loud, or even just in my head, I would have spotted the time/place thing. Erst is a bit more doubtful, as I sometimes use nur when I know I should use erst, but sich heiraten ... I just guessed. If in doubt, throw a sich into the sentence.

What you're guessing is partly correct - it's the reason why you can't use (1) while the doctor is still writing. However, when he has finished writing but you haven't yet left the room, both sentences can be used interchangeably, and I think I'd actually prefer to use (2), because the situation in which the doctor is prescribing something is not yet over. If you called the doctor on the phone an hour later though, you'd have to use (1).

Yeah, I understand that. I guess it's something more to do with the boundaries of the meaning of prescribe/verschreiben than with how the tenses of either language work. At the stage where the prescription is in my hand, I'd regard the action as finished, but I guess you could regard it as an action that continues up until the end of an appointment. I'm actually not so sure this is even an English/German thing ... might just be a personal thing and maybe on a different day I might think about it differently.

Reporting speech from long ago
All the online learning aids I've found that deal with indirekte Rede seem only to use situations where the original sentence was in Präsens, Perfekt or Futur I (ie. verb forms where the finite verb is in Präsens), which is easy enough, although I would just like to confirm that no backshift occurs in something which is definitely only possible in the past, for example, when someone is dead.

"Ich habe Hunger. = "I'm hungry."
(1) An einem warmen, sonnigen Sonntag im Jahrgang 1965 sagte Elvis Presley, er habe Hunger.
(2) An einem warmen, sonnigen Sonntag im Jahrgang 1965 sagte Elvis Presley, dass er Hunger habe.
(3) An einem warmen, sonnigen Sonntag im Jahr 1965 hat Elvis Presley gesagt, dass er Hunger hat.
(4) An einem warmen, sonnigen Sonntag im Jahr 1965 hat Elvis Presley gesagt, er hat Hunger .

Correct? (I have a feeling that (4) is a bit weird or wrong, and I really want to say hatte in (3) and (4))

(1) and (2) are correct, if a bit old-fashioned. (2) with hatte would be more natural in writing today. (3) is grammatically questionable and (4) is colloquial; the best option for both of these would indeed be An einem warmen, sonnigen Sonntag im Jahr 1965 hat Elvis Presley gesagt, dass er Hunger hatte.

Is that because he's dead and there's no way it's still continuing? What if a friend of mine just said Ich habe Hunger a minute ago? Would hat be more likely? And what if he said it two hours ago and I know that he's eaten since then? Is hatte now better again?

(1), (4), (5), and (6) are all acceptable.

Great!

(5) sounds a bit strange, but that's only because the Perfekt suggests an informal style, but the informal way to say "the day before" would be am Tag vorher rather than am vorigen Tag.

Ha, yeah, I don't know why I wrote am vorigen Tag. I don't think I've ever actually said it out loud. I always say am Tag zuvor. Am vorigen Tag might have been in my head because I read it recently or something. I knew it was more formal ...

(6) would be preferred in written German, but this kind of tense backshift can in fact also be used in informal speech to emphasize that the reported event happened fairly long ago.

It seems to me as if tense backshift, which according to your sources should not happen, is currently gaining ground in German

Interesting. I wish this were represented in some of the materials I'm coming across. Just before I read your reply, I found this site, which was the best I had found so far because it actually mentions what happens to all the tenses (except for two, Präteritum and Plusquamperfekt which it just leaves blank ... I suppose implying that there's no change). I read that and then I read your reply and it seemed to throw everything in the air. I suppose the fact that the backshift is not unheard of in German prossibly accounts for the fact that I've never had my backshifting pointed out to me until hwatting did in the fluency thread, and in that case it may have just been a disagreement about when the act of prescribing/verschreiben finishes.

Anyway, if you look at that site (this one) you'll see that it prescribes Konjunktiv I (or informally Präsens (indicative)) to replace any finite verb that is uttered in the Präsens, when the Konjunktiv I is the same as Präsens, it recommends replacing it with Konjunktiv II, and when that's the same as Präteritum it recommends würde- + the infinitive. Does that seem at all reasonable? You said the things with habe sound really old fashioned. Isn't this set of rules what they still use in news reports? I know news reports are quite a formal style, but do they sound really old fashioned or just overly formal? These are pretty much the rules I learned a long time ago, but I know that no one sticks to them and when I realised that I didn't know what to do if I wasn't backshifting, and I also didn't know how the formal rules apply to other tenses ...

but more likely as part of a general replacement of the Konjunktiv forms of auxiliary verbs with their respective Präteritum forms.

Huh, do you mean things like könnte are being replaced by konnte?

(For most other verbs in spoken German, the Konjunktiv isn't used any longer anyway, and the Präteritum is more or less dead too

In the way I speak German, I think I generally use the Präteritum of sein, haben, werden and the modal verbs and sometimes also kommen, gehen, geben, denken and wissen. I basically never use the Konjunktiv I and only use the Konjunktiv II for sein, haben, mögen, können, maybe occasionally with the other modals and possibly wissen and with everything else, I use würde (including with werden itself). I'll use Konjunktiv II or Präteritum of any verb from time to time if I want to sound funny. Does any of that sound terribly weird?

except in imperfective background subclauses.)

A German friend of mine used the word saß one day, and I thought it was funny. I think it was in a background situation, like Als ich im Bus saß, .... Anyway, I started using Präteritum around her, just because I found it funny, and she told me that there are some verbs that no one uses in Präteritum. She said no one ever says Ich aß but that ich saß is OK in some contexts. Would you agree with that?

[Cedh]

Reporting speech from long ago
All the online learning aids I've found that deal with indirekte Rede seem only to use situations where the original sentence was in Präsens, Perfekt or Futur I (ie. verb forms where the finite verb is in Präsens), which is easy enough, although I would just like to confirm that no backshift occurs in something which is definitely only possible in the past, for example, when someone is dead.

"Ich habe Hunger. = "I'm hungry."
(1) An einem warmen, sonnigen Sonntag im Jahrgang 1965 sagte Elvis Presley, er habe Hunger.
(2) An einem warmen, sonnigen Sonntag im Jahrgang 1965 sagte Elvis Presley, dass er Hunger habe.
(3) An einem warmen, sonnigen Sonntag im Jahr 1965 hat Elvis Presley gesagt, dass er Hunger hat.
(4) An einem warmen, sonnigen Sonntag im Jahr 1965 hat Elvis Presley gesagt, er hat Hunger .

Correct? (I have a feeling that (4) is a bit weird or wrong, and I really want to say hatte in (3) and (4))

(1) and (2) are correct, if a bit old-fashioned. (2) with hatte would be more natural in writing today. (3) is grammatically questionable and (4) is colloquial; the best option for both of these would indeed be An einem warmen, sonnigen Sonntag im Jahr 1965 hat Elvis Presley gesagt, dass er Hunger hatte.

Is that because he's dead and there's no way it's still continuing? What if a friend of mine just said Ich habe Hunger a minute ago? Would hat be more likely? And what if he said it two hours ago and I know that he's eaten since then? Is hatte now better again?

Hmm. hat would tend to be used if the situation still holds, but I don't think hatte really always implies that the situation is over - maybe it acts more like a replacement of the Konjunktiv II form hätte when the situation is not clearly irrealis...

It seems to me as if tense backshift, which according to your sources should not happen, is currently gaining ground in German

Interesting. I wish this were represented in some of the materials I'm coming across. Just before I read your reply, I found this site, which was the best I had found so far because it actually mentions what happens to all the tenses (except for two, Präteritum and Plusquamperfekt which it just leaves blank ... I suppose implying that there's no change). I read that and then I read your reply and it seemed to throw everything in the air. I suppose the fact that the backshift is not unheard of in German prossibly accounts for the fact that I've never had my backshifting pointed out to me until hwatting did in the fluency thread, and in that case it may have just been a disagreement about when the act of prescribing/verschreiben finishes.

Anyway, if you look at that site (this one) you'll see that it prescribes Konjunktiv I (or informally Präsens (indicative)) to replace any finite verb that is uttered in the Präsens, when the Konjunktiv I is the same as Präsens, it recommends replacing it with Konjunktiv II, and when that's the same as Präteritum it recommends würde- + the infinitive. Does that seem at all reasonable? You said the things with habe sound really old fashioned. Isn't this set of rules what they still use in news reports? I know news reports are quite a formal style, but do they sound really old fashioned or just overly formal? These are pretty much the rules I learned a long time ago, but I know that no one sticks to them and when I realised that I didn't know what to do if I wasn't backshifting, and I also didn't know how the formal rules apply to other tenses ...

That's the set of rules for formal language, yes. It's still used in news reports, but outside of those you don't hear that style much anymore, not even from politicians in pre-written speeches. You'll read it fairly often though, mostly in the news and in formal articles, but rarely in contemporary narrative prose. The main reason I called it "old-fashioned" was probably that your precise examples would IMO most likely show up in a narrative text, and there it is indeed somewhat out of date unless the story is set at least a few decades ago.

but more likely as part of a general replacement of the Konjunktiv forms of auxiliary verbs with their respective Präteritum forms.

Huh, do you mean things like könnte are being replaced by konnte?

Yes. But now that I come to think of it again, maybe that's not so much a "general replacement" but a modality distinction: The replacement sequence you mentioned above, along with the fact that many verbs never had fully distinct Konjunktiv forms, has led to a situation where you can often use the Konjunktiv II, the Präteritum, or the würde + INF construction more or less interchangeably. Of course there's a difference in register (würde + INF is always rather colloquial, and the two others are general register for auxiliaries, higher register for common matrix verbs, and formal or even archaic for other verbs), but it seems to me that people have started to strengthen the distinction between Konjunktiv II and Präteritum by associating the former with irrealis semantics exclusively: The Präteritum appears to be in the process of taking over most non-irrealis uses of the Konjunktiv II (such as reported speech), but the latter stays alive in situations where the speaker wants to specify that a situation is hypothetical (for instance, you can't use konnte in Wenn ich mehr üben würde, dann könnte ich besser Klavier spielen).

In the way I speak German, I think I generally use the Präteritum of sein, haben, werden and the modal verbs and sometimes also kommen, gehen, geben, denken and wissen. I basically never use the Konjunktiv I and only use the Konjunktiv II for sein, haben, mögen, können, maybe occasionally with the other modals and possibly wissen and with everything else, I use würde (including with werden itself). I'll use Konjunktiv II or Präteritum of any verb from time to time if I want to sound funny. Does any of that sound terribly weird?

No, that sounds quite natural IMO. You seem to have quite a good grasp of how native speakers tend to use these forms

except in imperfective background subclauses.)

A German friend of mine used the word saß one day, and I thought it was funny. I think it was in a background situation, like Als ich im Bus saß, .... Anyway, I started using Präteritum around her, just because I found it funny, and she told me that there are some verbs that no one uses in Präteritum. She said no one ever says Ich aß but that ich saß is OK in some contexts. Would you agree with that?

Yes. The more durative a verb is (or better yet: stative), the more likely you can still use it in the Präteritum these days.

[Imralu]

Hmm. hat would tend to be used if the situation still holds, but I don't think hatte really always implies that the situation is over - maybe it acts more like a replacement of the Konjunktiv II form hätte when the situation is not clearly irrealis...

So, I guess it's not all that different from English. If the situation is definitely over, we have to do the backshift "He said he was hungry." but if it's really recent or the situation can be assumed to still be true, the backshift is optional: "He said he is/was hungry." With the backshift sounds more neutral - you're just reporting the words, not taking responsibility for whether they're true or not.

I read that German does that too, but perhaps only prescriptively:

(1) Er sagt, er ist Krank. <- I probably believe him.
(2) Er sagt, er sei Krank. <- Just telling you what he told me. (Neutral)
(3) Er sagt, er wäre Krank. <- Pffft! As if!

That's what I read, anyway. To me, as a non-native speaker, sei doesn't feel neutral ... and I would probably only use it if I actually doubted whether the person was sick. (Eng. "Apparently, he's sick.") To me, the Konjunktiv I always feels a bit skeptical, but maybe that's just because it's a novelty for me, as a speaker of a language that doesn't use it.
And I don't think I'd say the third sentence at all, unless the original speaker said Ich wäre Krank, wenn ...

Anyway, if you look at that site (this one) you'll see that it prescribes Konjunktiv I (or informally Präsens (indicative)) to replace any finite verb that is uttered in the Präsens, when the Konjunktiv I is the same as Präsens, it recommends replacing it with Konjunktiv II, and when that's the same as Präteritum it recommends würde- + the infinitive.

That's the set of rules for formal language, yes. It's still used in news reports, but outside of those you don't hear that style much anymore, not even from politicians in pre-written speeches. You'll read it fairly often though, mostly in the news and in formal articles, but rarely in contemporary narrative prose. The main reason I called it "old-fashioned" was probably that your precise examples would IMO most likely show up in a narrative text, and there it is indeed somewhat out of date unless the story is set at least a few decades ago.

Would you recommend following those rules when, for example, writing a university style essay or an essay for a formal test of writing ability in German?

Yes. But now that I come to think of it again, maybe that's not so much a "general replacement" but a modality distinction: The replacement sequence you mentioned above, along with the fact that many verbs never had fully distinct Konjunktiv forms, has led to a situation where you can often use the Konjunktiv II, the Präteritum, or the würde + INF construction more or less interchangeably. Of course there's a difference in register (würde + INF is always rather colloquial, and the two others are general register for auxiliaries, higher register for common matrix verbs, and formal or even archaic for other verbs), but it seems to me that people have started to strengthen the distinction between Konjunktiv II and Präteritum by associating the former with irrealis semantics exclusively: The Präteritum appears to be in the process of taking over most non-irrealis uses of the Konjunktiv II (such as reported speech), but the latter stays alive in situations where the speaker wants to specify that a situation is hypothetical (for instance, you can't use konnte in Wenn ich mehr üben würde, dann könnte ich besser Klavier spielen).

Yeah, I have a friend who I taught enough German to that he had no problems when he lived in Germany for a year, although his grammar can be a bit of a mess at times. Anyway, I explained the difference between war-wäre, hatte-hätte, konnte-könnte as something like "Umlauts make these words hypothetical," and he doesn't have too many problems with these words.

In the way I speak German, I think I generally use the Präteritum of sein, haben, werden and the modal verbs and sometimes also kommen, gehen, geben, denken and wissen. I basically never use the Konjunktiv I and only use the Konjunktiv II for sein, haben, mögen, können, maybe occasionally with the other modals and possibly wissen and with everything else, I use würde (including with werden itself). I'll use Konjunktiv II or Präteritum of any verb from time to time if I want to sound funny. Does any of that sound terribly weird?

No, that sounds quite natural IMO. You seem to have quite a good grasp of how native speakers tend to use these forms

Great!

Yes. The more durative a verb is (or better yet: stative), the more likely you can still use it in the Präteritum these days.

So saß, lag, stand? ... Brauchte? What about wartete? To me, it just sounds clumsy.
I saw a website say that bleiben is often used in the Präteritum, but I don't think I've ever heard anyone say blieb. It just seems weird. Ich blieb gestern Abend zu Hause und aß mein Abendessen, während ich fernsah und meine Katze streichelte. Dan trank ich 'ne Flasche wein und schlief auf dem Sofa ein.

[Hallow XIII]

Okay. Reported speech in the perfect and past anterior is a bit of a bitch, so I'll tell you how to do it in a formal context where people will care if you replace the Subjunctive with an Imperfect:

Reported Speech in other tenses
What about reporting speech where the finite verb of the original sentence was not in Präsens?

"Gestern war ich hier". = "Yesterday I was here."
Sie sagte, sie wäre am vorigen Tag da.
Sie hat gesagt, dass sie am vorigen Tag da war.
Eng. = "She said she had been there the day before."

"Ich konnte Klavier spielen, als ich fünf war. = "I could play the piano when I was five.
Sie erzählte mir, sie könnte Klavier spielen, als sie fünf war.
Sie hat mir erzählt, dass sie Klavier spielen konnte, als sie fünf war.

"Ich hatte das schon gesehen, bevor du es mir gezeigt hast." = "I'd seen that before you showed it to me."
Er sagte, er hätte das schon gesehen, bevor ich es ihm gezeigt habe.
Er hat mir gesagt, dass er das schon gesehen hatte, bevor ich es ihm gezeigt habe.
Eng. = "He told me (that) he had seen that before I (had) showed it to him."

Correct?

Well, not really. You must use a periphrastic construction, like this:

"Gestern war ich hier". = "Yesterday I was here."
Sie sagte, sie sei am vorigen Tag da gewesen.
Sie hat gesagt, dass sie am vorigen Tag da war.
Eng. = "She said she had been there the day before."

"Ich konnte Klavier spielen, als ich fünf war. = "I could play the piano when I was five.
Sie erzählte mir, sie habe Klavier spielen können, als sie fünf war.
Sie hat mir erzählt, dass sie Klavier spielen konnte, als sie fünf war.

"Ich hatte das schon gesehen, bevor du es mir gezeigt hast." = "I'd seen that before you showed it to me."
Er sagte, er habe das schon gesehen, bevor ich es ihm gezeigt hätte. (note: this usage is the last vestige of the S. II's heritage as a subjunctive imperfect)
Er hat mir gesagt, dass er das schon gesehen hatte, bevor ich es ihm gezeigt habe.
Eng. = "He told me (that) he had seen that before I (had) showed it to him."

(1) Er sagt, er ist Krank. <- I probably believe him.
(2) Er sagt, er sei Krank. <- Just telling you what he told me. (Neutral)
(3) Er sagt, er wäre Krank. <- Pffft! As if!

Yep.

Slipperly slope of tense, time and place
Assuming the original sentence is being reported at a much later date and in a different place, in English we have to change time and place dependent phrases such as "yesterday" and "here" to "the day before" and "there". I feel like it has to be done in German too, but then if tense doesn't need to be changed, in my head, it puts it all on a slippery slope. If you don't change tense, why change time expressions? And if time expressions don't need to be changed, why change place expressions? And if place expressions don't need to be changed, why change grammatical person? I'll illustrate the slope of changes.

"Ich habe gestern nichts gegessen, weil ich den ganzen Tag hier in meinem Bett geblieben bin."

(1) Er hat vor ein paar Wochen gesagt; "Ich habe gestern nichts gegessen, weil ich den ganzen Tag hier in meinem Bett geblieben bin."
- nothing changed - direct speech

(2) Er hat vor ein paar Wochen gesagt, dass ich gestern nichts gegessen habe, weil ich den ganzen Tag hier in meinem Bett geblieben bin.
- quotation subordinated - grammatical person, place, time and tense all relate to perspective of the speaker of the original text - misleading!

(3) Er hat vor ein paar Wochen gesagt, dass er gestern nichts gegessen hat, weil er den ganzen Tag hier in seinem Bett geblieben ist.
- grammatical person changed to relate to the perspective of the reporter - place, time and tense all relate to perspective of the original speech act

(4) Er hat vor ein paar Wochen gesagt, dass er gestern nichts gegessen hat, weil er den ganzen Tag da in seinem Bett geblieben ist.
- place phrase changed to relate to the perspective of the reporter - time and tense still relate to the perspective of the original speech act

(5) Er hat vor ein paar Wochen gesagt, dass er am vorigen Tag nichts gegessen hat, weil er den ganzen Tag da in seinem Bett geblieben ist.
- time phrase changed to relate to the perspective of the reporter - tense left in relation to the perspective of the original speech act

(6) Er hat vor ein paar Wochen gesagt, dass er am vorigen Tag nichts gegessen hatte, weil er den ganzen Tag da in seinem Bett geblieben war.
- everything, including tense, changed to relate to the perspective of the reporter rather than the original speech act

I'm guessing that, in German, (1) and (5) (or maybe (4)?) are allowable and the others are not ... but to me, (5) seems like kind of a funny place to stop. This is bothering only because I'm not exactly sure where to stop. If I don't change tense back, what do I have to change? Which, if any, is a correct way to report the sentence at the top of the quote box?

Actually, neither 4) or 5) are correct; 6) instead is allowable if you regard the subjunctive as superfluous. I'd do it like this:

Er hat vor ein paar Wochen gesagt, dass er am vorigen Tag nichts gegessen habe, weil er den ganzen Tag in seinem Bett geblieben sei.

[Imralu]

Thanks, HALLOW XIII!

So, if the original sentence was in Präteritum or Plusquamperfekt, you use Konjunktiv I of haben or sein and the Partizip II, just like if the original sentence had been in Perfekt, right?

[Hallow XIII]

Exactly. Basically, all you do is replace the active Hilfsverb with one in the subjunctive and you're set.

EDIT: There are exceptions with verbs like können or müssen that use the infinitive instead of the participle. You can use the participle instead to give a sense of remote past, but it is a rare construction.

[Imralu]

A couple of new questions:

I'm working my way through a vocabulary book. Some of it's pretty basic but can't hurt. The book lists der Wirt / die Wirtin as "landlord / landlady" and makes no mention of Vermieter/in. Am I right in understanding that a Vermieter/in is a landlord/landlady in the normal sense (as in the owner of the house or apartment you rent) whereas a Wirt/in is someone who lets you live with them in a room in their place, making you not a tenant ( =Mieter/in?) but a boarder (= Untermieter/in?). Correct? I have looked in quite a few German-only dictionaries and found the definitions to be a bit vague.

The book also has some exercises like the following:
(1) Jutta ist die Schwester meines Vaters. Sie ist mein ______
(2) Jürgen ist Deutscher. Das bin ich auch. Er ist mein ________.

The answers to those are Tante and Landsmann respectively.

The one that threw me was Herr Schuster wohnt in der Wohnung neben meiner. Er ist mein ___________.
I wrote Nachbar but the answer in the back of the book was Mitbewohner. Huh? Is the book wrong or is there a big difference between how "flatmate" and "neighbour" are used in English and German?

Finally, in the word Matrikel, is the <i> /I/ or /i:/? I think the former because of Artikel but I can't find proof anywhere.

[Hallow XIII]

1) You are more or less correct. The point is that a Wirt/in is the owner of a restaurant or Gasthaus, which I suppose is best translated by inn. If you rent living space from a Wirt, then you're staying at an inn and have rented a room or something not much bigger. However, in this case you would still be a Mieter; Untermieter is used only to describe what happens when you rent a flat and then rent out some space for someone else to live in. In this case, the Mieter rents it from the owner and the Untermieter rents it from the tenant.

2) That "Mitbewohner" thing is bullshit. If he lives in the flat next to yours, he's certainly your neighbour (-> Nachbar), but not your Mitbewohner, which would make people think he was your roommate.

3) You're correct, it's the same vowel as in Artikel.

[Imralu]

Thanks Hallow XIII!

I think the neighbour/flatmate thing was probably a case of the exercise being changed and the answers in the back of the book being forgotten.

[Imralu]

Another question: I was just watching this interview with Robert Harting, who was robbed while drunk and passed out after winning the Olympic gold medal in the men's discus in London last year. They asked him what he would have done if he had caught the thief and he said

Die Themse war in der Nähe, also auf jeden Fall hätte er schwimmen müssen können.

Huh? I wasn't sure if I had heard that right. I did. I expected hätte er schwimmen können müssen (= "he would have had to be able to swim") but he definitely said "hätte er schwimmen müssen können (= "he would have been able to have to swim"???).

I googled it to see if he'd been quoted, but couldn't find it. I eventually found it quoted as

Die Themse war in der Nähe. Dafür hätte er schwimmen können müssen.

I find this guy really hard to understand because he's such a mumbler (I think, anyway), but in this quote, a pretty clear auf jeden fall got turned into a dafür, and the word order had been reversed, so I don't know if it's just sloppy quoting or if they've "corrected" him. What I want to know is if Mr Harting's original sentence is incorrect. Does it strike other Germans as a simple mistake in speech? Is it a dialectism? Does it sound uneducated or sloppy? Or, have I drawn the wrong conclusions? Does the können simply express possibility, thus making the English translation more like "he might have had to swim"?

Another possibility is that there's another weird word order thing lurking in German that I haven't discovered yet. I still haven't really come to terms with the weird positioning of hätte in subordinate clauses with verb structures where the infinitive is used as the past participle (eg. weil ich dich hätte sehen sollen instead of what I had expected: weil ich dich sehen sollen hätte). I understand it, and I can deal with languages being arbitrary and inconsistent, but German word order is pretty consistent up until this weird thing that just happens in one specific set of circumstances. Is there another weird thing with the order of modal verbs when there are two of them, with a "hätte" and another verb.

[Hallow XIII]

Actually, his speech is just plain wrong. It happens to all of us; I daresay that fucking up your grammar and/or syntax is a hallmark of trying to speak in highly inflected languages. Heck, I even do that in English.

Bottom line, the quote from Welt is the correct form and so were your assumptions.

[Imralu]

Thanks again! Pretty cool to notice a native speaker's error. Vielleicht hat er nie gelernt, sich artizukulieren. Does it sound dumb or just normal?

Do you really think people are more likely to misspeak in inflecting languages? This was a syntax mistake. I'm sure people put words out of order sometimes in every language. I most frequently do it with parts of words. After a week of being home sick from work, I could hardly get through a sentence when I got back. "Whiteboard" became "ward". I said "bed" when I meant "chair" and the worst one was something like "I gonnam be" instead of "I'm gonna be".

I remember an interview with Anna Nicole Smith on Australian TV, shortly before she died, and she said something like "But now I can't drink as much as I used to could." Both she and the interviewer looked confused and then moved on awkwardly.

[Hallow XIII]

Let me rephrase that: a certain kind of syntax error happens more in inflected languages. That's usually to do with succession of time and succession of mood, both of which, incidentally, can be violated in English almost as well as in German because of the latter's descent from such a language.

Übrigens: war dein Satz da ironisch gemeint? "Artikulieren" ist nämlich kein zusammengesetztes Wort, weisst du.

[Salmoneus]

I remember an interview with Anna Nicole Smith on Australian TV, shortly before she died, and she said something like "But now I can't drink as much as I used to could." Both she and the interviewer looked confused and then moved on awkwardly.

That one might not have been an error (though it probably was). Lots of dialects do weird thing with stacked auxilliaries/modals.

My father, for instance, still sometimes reflects his native dialect's habit of combining finite modals as sort of serial verbs - most commonly, saying things like "then we won't can X", for "in which case we will not be able to X".

[Imralu]

Let me rephrase that: a certain kind of syntax error happens more in inflected languages. That's usually to do with succession of time and succession of mood, both of which, incidentally, can be violated in English almost as well as in German because of the latter's descent from such a language.

Can you give me an example?

Übrigens: war dein Satz da ironisch gemeint? "Artikulieren" ist nämlich kein zusammengesetztes Wort, weisst du.

Kennst du dieses Lied?
Wir kulieren uns doch arti, oder?

And yeah, I did think the "used to could" thing could have been just a dialect, but she was clearly wasted and she looked confused after she said it.

[Terra]

And yeah, I did think the "used to could" thing could have been just a dialect, but she was clearly wasted and she looked confused after she said it.

I remember an interview with Anna Nicole Smith on Australian TV, shortly before she died, and she said something like "But now I can't drink as much as I used to could." Both she and the interviewer looked confused and then moved on awkwardly.

It's because the can/could paradigm is broken, requiring "be able" to fill the gaps. (I can't remember the proper term for this.)

If she looked confused, it's probably not a dialectal thing; She just got screwed over by the irregular paradigm and could tell that something was wrong, but couldn't pinpoint what, because the regular paradigm kept interfering and telling her that what she just said was right. Compare:

1a) I can/could drink a bottle of beer in a minute.
1b) *I used to can/could drink a bottle of beer in a minute.
1c) I used to be able to drink a bottle of beer in a minute.

2a) I want to drink a bottle of beer in a minute.
2b) I used to want to drink a bottle of beer in a minute.

So yes, inflection strikes down another.

My father, for instance, still sometimes reflects his native dialect's habit of combining finite modals as sort of serial verbs - most commonly, saying things like "then we won't can X", for "in which case we will not be able to X".

Tying inflection vs isolation into information theory, do you (or anybody else) know about any studies/calculations done on comparisons of the two as they're exemplified in natural language?

[Drydic]

Used to could is in fact a quite widespread Southernism. Partially thanks to Jeff Foxworthy.

[Imralu]

I've got another question. I've been watching Tatort and I'm subtitling it to show to my boyfriend. What does the woman (Inga) say here:

Inga: Seit wann kannst denn du Türkisch?

Nils: Ich? Ähm, ich ... eine ganz nette Nachbarin.

Inga: Ach ja? __________?

Nein, Quatsch! Ich dachte, das hilft doch beim Zeugenbefragen, aber es ist eine höllenkomplizierte Sprache. Nach einem halben Jahr habe ich das Handtuch geschmissen.

________________________

And the second one, it sounds like "Rojin lebte mit sich und der Familie im Rhein, bis diese Frau ihr einredete, sie müsse sich von ihrer Familie und ihren Traditionen befreien."

Is that an idiom "mit jdn im Rhein leben", or have I misheard it?

[Cedh]

Inga: Ach ja? Erzähl mal!

(She's clipping the first syllable and both instances of coda /l/, so it sounds like [tseɐ̯mɐ].)
________________________

"Rojin lebte mit sich und der Familie im Reinen, bis diese Frau ihr einredete, sie müsse sich von ihrer Familie und ihren Traditionen befreien."

("mit sich im Reinen sein" means "be at peace with oneself".)

[Imralu]

Inga: Ach ja? Erzähl mal!

(She's clipping the first syllable and both instances of coda /l/, so it sounds like [tseɐ̯mɐ].)
________________________

"Rojin lebte mit sich und der Familie im Reinen, bis diese Frau ihr einredete, sie müsse sich von ihrer Familie und ihren Traditionen befreien."

("mit sich im Reinen sein" means "be at peace with oneself".)

Thank you

I actually the first one was Erzähl mir at first, but I couldn't be sure.

[Imralu]

I've got another one from the same episode. This sentence has me completely stumped.
Here it is.

It's something about a Muslim-Macho, unser lieber Doctor and zusammenhocken. All of that makes sense to me and fits the plot, but I don't know what the sentence that holds them together is. It sounds like a conditional sentence, but I can't really nail anything down. I don't want to write what I hear in case it throws someone off. For context, so you don't have to watch the whole episode, I think she's worried that the doctor, whose Turkish wife was murdered, may have teamed up with her chauvinistic, controlling brother.

Also, can anyone think of a good way to translate "Mein Alptraum-Favorit bleibt ja dieser ältere Bruder"?
I think I understand what it means but I can't think of a way to say it in English.

Any help would be hugely appreciated.

[hwhatting]

I've got another one from the same episode. This sentence has me completely stumped.
Here it is.

It's something about a Muslim-Macho, unser lieber Doctor and zusammenhocken. All of that makes sense to me and fits the plot, but I don't know what the sentence that holds them together is.

The sentence is:
Ich will nicht wissen, welchen Muslim-Macho-Müll der und unser lieber Doktor reden, wenn sie zusammenhocken.
"I’d rather not know what kind of Muslim macho garbage this guy and our dear doctor are talking, when they’re sitting together."
IMD zusammenhocken, lit „to squat together“, has a slightly deprecative note, but in some German dialects hocken is a neutral equivalent for sitzen. Still, they seem to speak Standard German here, so I assume a deprecative note is intended.

Also, can anyone think of a good way to translate "Mein Alptraum-Favorit bleibt ja dieser ältere Bruder"?
I think I understand what it means but I can't think of a way to say it in English.

I'd translate it this way: "As nightmares go, my favourite remains this older brother."

[Imralu]

And your English translation was ingenious ... separating nightmare and favourite with topicalisation. Well done! You have fully earned this violin and rose. (!?!)

in some German dialects hocken is a neutral equivalent for sitzen

Bairisch is one of them, isn't it? In standard German, I always think of it as meaning squat, and to me, zusammenhocken sounds kind of like "huddle together", although I haven't found that as anyone else's translation.