An Etymological Dictionary of the German Language/Annotated/heute

by Friedrich Kluge

heute, adverb, ‘to-day,’ from the equivalent Middle High German hiute, Old High German hiutu; compare Old Saxon hiudu, hiudiga (whence Anglo-Saxon heódœg), Old Frisian hiudega, ‘to-day’; a West Teutonic adverb for Gothic *hiô daga, ‘on this day,’ with the accent on the pronoun, which resulted in the combination of the two words. In the same way *hiutagu became hiutgu, hiuttu, and was finally shortened into hiutu (compare the similar origin of heuer). Farther, Latin ho-die and Greek σ-ήμερον are similarly compounded. Likewise for heute Nacht, ‘to-night,’ Old High German and Middle High German had a parallel adverb; compare Old High German hî-naht (Middle High German hînet), ‘to-night’ (in Bavarian and Suabian heint is used for ‘to-day’). The pronominal stem hi- contained in it appears in Gothic in a few cases, and indeed as a temporal pronoun, ‘this’; compare himma daga, ‘to-day,’ and hina dag, ‘until to-day,’ &c. In the Saxon dialects this pronominal stem, which corresponds to Latin ci- in ci-s, ci-tra, appears as a 3rd personal pronoun; compare English he, Anglo-Saxon hê, English him, Anglo-Saxon him (Gothic himma), &c., Old Saxon and Low German hê, ‘he.’ See further her, hier.