Cover of the Duden dictionary, Die deutsche Rechtschreibung

Since 1880 one name has stood for the correct spelling of German words: Duden. It is to German what the OED is to English.

Who was Konrad Duden?

Konrad Duden was born on 3 January 1829 near Wesel on the Lower Rhine. He studied history and German philology in Bonn and took part in the revolution of 1848. After working as a private tutor in Genoa, where he met his future wife, he returned to Germany as a grammar school teacher and later became a headmaster.

One spelling for all German speakers

In the 1870s German had no common spelling. Each state, and often each school, followed its own rules. Duden set out to change that. In 1872 he published Die deutsche Rechtschreibung, and in 1880 his Vollständiges Orthographisches Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache, a complete spelling dictionary of around 27,000 words.

In 1901 a conference in Berlin agreed common spelling rules for the German Empire, largely based on his dictionary. Austria and Switzerland adopted them soon after. Konrad Duden died in 1911.

Who sets German spelling today?

Since 2004 the Council for German Orthography has set the official rules for the German-speaking countries. From 1955 until the 1996 spelling reform, Duden itself was the binding reference in West Germany. Today Duden follows the Council’s rules and remains the best-known German dictionary.

German teaching still builds on Duden’s work. You can learn German with our native tutors in private German lessons in London or online German lessons.