German edit

 
krabbeln

Etymology edit

From Middle Low German krabbelen (to crawl), an iterative form of krabben (to scrape). Compare Dutch krabbelen and krabben. Possibly derived from Krabbe (crab). A strong counterargument to this, however, is the cognate krappeln in Middle High German, which did not have the noun.

Pronunciation edit

  • IPA(key): /ˈkʁabəln/, [ˈkʁabəln], [ˈkʁabl̩n]
  • (file)

Verb edit

krabbeln (weak, third-person singular present krabbelt, past tense krabbelte, past participle gekrabbelt, auxiliary haben or sein)

  1. (intransitive) to crawl (typically, but not always, of a baby or insect) [auxiliary haben or sein]
    Synonym: kriechen
  2. (transitive) to tickle, especially by making fast movements with all fingers of one hand [auxiliary haben]

Conjugation edit

Further reading edit

  • krabbeln” in Digitales Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache
  • krabbeln” in Uni Leipzig: Wortschatz-Lexikon
  • krabbeln” in Duden online
  • krabbeln” in OpenThesaurus.de