Zwickmühle

German

Etymology

Alteration of older Fickmühle, a compound of ficken +‎ Mühle, in which ficken is used in the archaic sense of “to slide”. The alteration was without doubt driven by the need to avoid the vulgar verb. Formally it may be due to conflation with an unattested *Zwiemühle from zwie- (“double”), as well as to association with zwicken (“to pinch”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈtsvɪkˌmyːlə/, [ˈt͡sʋɪkˌmyːlə]

• Audio:

  (file)

• Hyphenation: Zwick‧müh‧le

Noun

Zwickmühle f (genitive Zwickmühle, plural Zwickmühlen)

1. (nine men's morris) double mill
2. (figurative) dilemma; Catch-22; quagmire; predicament; quandary (position in which one will suffer great disadvantage however one reacts)

Further reading

• Zwickmühle on the German Wikipedia.Wikipedia ^de
• “Zwickmühle” in Duden online