Wie, bitte?

July 23, 2007 3:58 PM

Help me with a German sentence (quote?). German speakers: is the following sentence a quote from German literature? It's in reference to a picture of a Jewish headstone with pebbles on it. "Wieviel Wissen wird unter diesen Steinen liegen" Just wondering if this is a literary quote, or merely the musings of the commentor.
posted by nax to Writing & Language (4 answers total)

It says literally " how much knowledge will under these stones lie". More properly, it means "how much knowledge is buried under these stones?".

I don't know if it's a phrase from literature, and I've never encountered it myself. I would vote for it being an epitaph of some sort by the commentator. But I could be wrong.
posted by Pogo_Fuzzybutt at 4:14 PM on July 23, 2007

Yeah, I'd basically translate that as "How much knowledge will lie beneath these stones?"

I can't find anything with that quote, so I'm going to have to agree that it's a unique epitaph.
posted by atomly at 4:18 PM on July 23, 2007

Doesn't sound familiar.
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 4:23 PM on July 23, 2007

I'm not familiar with the quotation, but I do know that, according to Jewish tradition, mourners are to place a pebble on the grave each time they pay respect.
posted by nilihm at 4:51 PM on July 23, 2007