An Etymological Dictionary of the German Language/Annotated/List

by Friedrich Kluge

List, feminine, ‘craft, cunning, deceit,’ from Middle High German and Old High German list, masculine (feminine in Middle German and Old High German), ‘wisdom, prudence, slyness, sly purpose, cunning, art.’ Gothic lists is by chance not recorded with the Modern High German sense only. The meaning ‘prudence’ is the originally one; Anglo-Saxon list, feminine, ‘art, propriety, cunning,’ English list; Old Icelandic list, feminine, ‘prudence, skill in an art, propriety.’ Thus the signification of the word fluctuates in several dialects between the primary meaning ‘prudence’ and ‘cunning.’ The substantive, as an old abstract in ti (Gothic listi-ns, accusative plural), belongs by its structure to the Gothic preterite present lais, ‘I know’; the verbal stem lis, with the original sense ‘to know,’ is still widely diffused in High German, compare lehren and lernen. Moreover, on the common Teutonic listi- are based the Slavonic cognates of Old Slovenian lĭstĭ and the Romance class comprising French leste and Italian lesto, ‘skilful, nimble.’