müssen
From Wiktionary, the free dictionary
Etymology
From Middle High German muozen, from Old High German muozan, from Proto-West Germanic *mōtan.
The closeness to the original diphthong can for example still be seen in the Bavarian first and third person singular, where one says I muas (I must) or Ea/Si/Es muas (He/she/it must).
Pronunciation
Verb
müssen (preterite-present, third-person singular present muss, past tense musste, past participle gemusst, past subjunctive müsste, auxiliary haben)
- (auxiliary, with an infinitive → “müssen” replaces the past participle) to have to (do something); must; to be obliged (to do something); to need (to do something).
- Wir müssen es machen. ― We must do it.
- Wir müssen es nicht machen. ― We need not do it. / We do not need to do it.
- Ich musste es machen. ― I had to do it.
- (intransitive, with past participle “gemusst”) to have to do something implied; must; to be obliged.
- Ja, ich muss. ― Yes, I must.
- Ja, ich habe gemusst. ― Yes, I had to.
- (colloquial, euphemistic) to need to go to the bathroom.
- Ich muss mal. ― I have to go (to the bathroom).
Usage notes
- Müssen can express the necessity of doing something, but also the moral duty. Sollen expresses moral duty or the suggestion that something ought to be done. Both verbs can express a duty imposed by someone else. In this case müssen is stronger than sollen, implying that the imposing person has some kind of power to make the other really do it.
- As shown in the first line, the infinitive is used instead of the past participle in the compound tenses if the verb has a complement verb. The phenomenon is called double infinitive.
- Das hätten wir machen müssen.
- We should have done that.
- Das hätten wir machen müssen.
- In southern German and Austrian speech, the infinitive is often used instead of the past participle in any construction. Thus: ich habe nicht müssen for standard ich habe nicht gemusst.
- As shown in the example above, nicht müssen translates into English as “need not” rather than “must not”. For the English “must not”, use nicht dürfen.
- Before 1996, several of the conjugated forms of müssen were spelled with an ß (that is, muß, mußte, müßte, etc.). Since the spelling reform of 1996, however, the acceptable spelling is with ss.
Conjugation
| infinitive | müssen | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| present participle | müssend | ||||
| past participle | gemusst | ||||
| auxiliary | haben | ||||
| indicative | subjunctive | ||||
| singular | plural | singular | plural | ||
| present | ich muss | wir müssen | i | ich müsse | wir müssen |
| du musst | ihr müsst | du müssest | ihr müsset | ||
| er muss | sie müssen | er müsse | sie müssen | ||
| preterite | ich musste | wir mussten | ii | ich müsste1 | wir müssten1 |
| du musstest | ihr musstet | du müsstest1 | ihr müsstet1 | ||
| er musste | sie mussten | er müsste1 | sie müssten1 | ||
| imperative | — | — | |||
1Preferred; avoid the alternative in würde.
Derived terms
- durchmüssen
- wegmüssen
- weitermüssen
- zurückmüssen
Further reading
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