Is there some hidden lore or did we just agree that "Nee Naw" was too weak?

I expect riveting information and nailbiting debates

(RO-AR licence plate is cool hahah)

by Zestyclose_Common423

25 comments

  2. The same reason a frog makes “quak”?

    Why does your ambulance make nee naw and not tatü tata? 

  3. I think wikipedia will answer your questions:

    [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martinshorn](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martinshorn)

    Edit: After reading the article, I notice it did not answer all of your questions. The English wikipedia article is obviously missing important info.

    The company Martin was ordered to develop a signal horn some time in the early 20th century. They came up with this horn and these tones. It was then just kept.

    There have been discussions about changing it to a more American way of signal horn which started about 15 years ago, but nothing has come out of it up to now.

    The German wikipedia article has more information:

    [https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Folgetonhorn](https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Folgetonhorn)

  4. It’s what it sounds like to native speakers. Yes, exactly like that.

  5. Because Tütatütü would sound like a piece of ballet clothing.

  7. Because of § 35 (Abs. 1 und Abs. 5a mit Abs. 8) i.V.m. § 38 Abs. 1 und 2 StVO, that´s why (also, DIN 14610 Akustische Warneinrichtungen für bevorrechtigte Wegebenutzer).

  8. Because the sound is reminiscent of trumpets, and “tatütata” is an german onomatopoeia of it

  9. Ambulance, firefighters, police etc all sound a little different in different countries. Why, no idea? It probably developed historically and then there were official rules made on it.

  10. Well this one goes ROAR!

    In all seriousness:

    The DIN 14610 say so because of course there’s a DIN

  11. Well this one is cosplaying as a Lion and goes Roaaar

  13. And the cockerel says kikeri -kee in German and not cock -a-doodle -doo , the dog says wau-wau and not bow -wow !.My husband and I used to laugh our heads off about the different interpretations when our kids were small.

  15. It is to mimic the Doppler effect. ‘tataaaa’ is obviously lower pitched. 🙂

  16. Now beside all the jokes here…
    I asked myself the very same question a while ago (I am not a german). And maybe found the answer for this complicated “Tatütata”.
    In the past, the sirens in Germany (fire brigade) weren’t of the usual two-tones type, but more indeed an “concert” of multiples tones.
    You still find this type of horns on very old vehicles or still used by the austrian police! (electronic horn, but the same melody).
    [look it up on youtube this is what I mean. ](https://youtu.be/3O-V1sHgBP8?si=ZYyEoiUY4b-onZCF)

  17. > did we just agree that “Nee Naw” was too weak?

    No, because in German “nee naw” was never even considered as an option. Even onomatapoeic words differ from language to language: an English-speaking rooster says “cock-a-doodle-do” but a German rooster says “kikiriki”; in English it’s ducks that say “quack”, but in German that’s the sound a frog makes.

    Obviously, both English “nee-naw” and German “tatütata” are imitative of the two-tone horn, even though the two-tone horn isn’t used so much in English-speaking countries now. The real mystery is why the German word has twice the number of syllables as the English word, and why the second half of the word is different.

    The best explanation I have been able to find so far, and it is just a conjecture, is that the German version includes the doppler effect: as the ambulance approaches you, its horn seems to have a noticeably higher pitch (“tatü…”) than it does when it passes by (“…tata”), so the German word imitates not just the horn itself, but the doppler shift as it speeds by.

  18. I remember reading that It was proven tatü is easier to recognize and hear through distances because of the frequency of those two tones. There was an explaining article about it.

  20. So that we can better memorize the structure of glucose.

  21. While some car manufacturers still do, some don’t, there used to be 2 horns in the car. Both together gave a more pleasant yet louder sound then either pitch alone. Instead of reinventing the wheel, they just hooked up the horns to me activated after each other. Now with electronic horns and sirens it just stuck as the generic sound.

    “Durch ein Tonfolgerelais, einen sogenannten Klangfolgeschalter: Ein Relais steuert wechselweise die verschieden gestimmten Aufschlaghörner (im Prinzip „normale“ Autohupen) an.” -> [https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Folgetonhorn](https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Folgetonhorn) (Wikipedia has more details and other origin stories)

  22. Depends on which siren they are using. The “countryside” horn is the louder and deeper with compressed air which is quite loyd and goes Tatütata. The electric and more quiet one sound a bit like “Zu spät, zu spät, zu spät” xD

  23. Because with this frequency change you are able to discern the direction it is coming from much quicker.

  24. I always preferred the British:

    REEEEEEEEEYUUUUUUUREEYUUREEYUUREEYUU

  25. Would be nicer if we could set it to vibration mode /s

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