21 December 2025
How do you say Witness in German?
Whether it’s someone who saw an accident, testifies in court, or signs a marriage certificate - Germans call them a Zeuge. It’s a word with legal weight, personal significance, and historical resonance.
The noun Zeuge means witness, and it’s one of the 1000 most frequently used nouns in German. You’ll hear it in law, police reports, personal stories, religious texts, and everyday conversation.
It’s a masculine noun, so we say der Zeuge.The feminine form is die Zeugin.
Pronunciation
Zeuge is pronounced [TSOY-guh].
- The “Z” is pronounced like “ts” (as in “pizza”),
- The “eu” sounds like “oy” (as in “boy”),
- The “ge” is a soft “guh,”
- Stress is on the first syllable: TSOY-ge
It’s sharp and direct - just like a courtroom statement.
Example sentences:
- Der Zeuge hat den Unfall genau beobachtet.The witness observed the accident closely.
- Sie trat als Zeugin vor Gericht auf.She appeared in court as a witness.
Nuance and usage tips
Zeuge belongs to a historical word family related to ziehen and giving evidence in court. The verb zeugen can mean to testify or indicate, as in von etwas zeugen. A separate sense means to father or beget a child.
It’s used in various contexts:
- Legal / judicial
- Augenzeuge - eyewitness
- Hauptzeuge - key witness
- Zeugenaussage - witness statement
- unter Zeugen - in the presence of witnesses
- Personal and ceremonial
- Trauzeuge - wedding witness (sometimes also the best man)
- Zeugenunterschrift - witness signature
- Historical or religious
- Zeitzeuge - contemporary (historical) witness
- Zeuge Jehovas - Jehovah’s Witness
Related legal words: Angeklagter means defendant and Täter means perpetrator. They name different roles, not lexical opposites of Zeuge.
Grammatical case examples:
- Nominative:Der Zeuge schilderte den Ablauf sehr genau.The witness described the sequence very precisely.
- Accusative:Ich habe den Zeugen befragt.I questioned the witness.
- Dative:Mit dem Zeugen sprachen die Ermittler zuerst.The investigators spoke with the witness first.
- Genitive:Die Aussage des Zeugen hat den Verdacht bestätigt.The witness’s statement confirmed the suspicion.
Masculine case pattern: der, den, dem, des - and Zeuge is an n-noun, so it becomes Zeugen in every case except the nominative singular (den Zeugen, dem Zeugen, des Zeugen).
Word variations and language tidbits
Variation Station:
- Zeugin - female witness
- Augenzeuge - eyewitness
- Trauzeuge - wedding witness (sometimes also the best man)
- Zeugenaussage - testimony
- Zeugenschutz - witness protection
- Zeitzeuge - someone who personally experienced historical events
Usage note: Zeugenschutz means witness protection in criminal proceedings. Protection of journalistic sources is usually called Quellenschutz. The term Zeitzeuge is particularly powerful when used in Holocaust education and remembrance:
Ein Zeitzeuge erzählt seine Geschichte.“A historical eyewitness shares his story.”
📘 Duden entry: https://www.duden.de/rechtschreibung/Zeuge
🎥 Learn Zeuge and the rest of the top 1000 German nouns in our free online video course:Watch the 1000 German Nouns video course
Alternate translations note:For testimony itself, use Aussage. Zeugnis can mean testimony or evidence, including religious testimony; it does not normally mean a person who witnesses something. But for a person who saw something, signed something, or can confirm something - Zeuge is the word that carries legal, personal, and historical weight.Ready for more German words of the day? Do you know what Zelle means? How about Zuhause? Find out!
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