I know you view uberleben literally as ''life over'' but it could well be interpreted as ''getting above life'' or "surviving. It has an interpretation. I see none in this context for gegenüber. But it obviously has or it wouldn't mean opposite. This won't be resolved here and is taking up space so time to stop. D.L. MacLaughlan-Dumes wrote: > On Apr 15, 2009, at 12:37 PM, JK wrote: > >> I'm afraid I don't understand how wherewithall relates to this. > > I gave you an English word where the meaning of the compound word > changes from the individual words because I assumed it would be easier > for you to understand in English. But if not.... > >> If you gave me another example of where über is used within a word and >> the meaning is changed, that would be helpful. > > Sure, "überleben", "to survive", made up of "over" and "life". It's > not a phenomenon related only to "über". Any compound word can carry a > meaning different from its root words. > >> Thank you for the Thode suggestion, I'll check into it > > It's a great help, particularly because it's oriented toward words > found in German genealogical records. A regular German-English > dictionary is good to have around too. > > Regards, > D.L. MacLaughlan-Dumes > http://sakionline.net/familypage > > ------------------------------- > To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to [email protected] with the word 'unsubscribe' without the quotes in the subject and the body of the message >