bürgen
German, verb
bürgen is spelled B-Ü-R-G-E-N (6 letters) and appears 3.5 times per million words in written German, the 16,125th most frequent German word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). Bürgen is a German verb meaning “to vouch” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). It is also a first/third-person plural subjunctive II of bergen. On this page, Burgen is a different word: “plural of Burg”. With a capital, Bürgen is a different word: “genitive singular of Bürge”. The German Wiktionary defines it as “für die Glaubwürdigkeit einer Person oder Sache einstehen”.
What does bürgen mean in English?
verb
- 1
to vouch
- 2
to guarantee
verb
- 1
first/third-person plural subjunctive II of bergen
noun
- 1
plural of Burg
noun
- 1
genitive singular of Bürge
- 2
plural of Bürge
Source: English Wiktionary, German section, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0).
How German dictionaries define it
verb: 1. für die Glaubwürdigkeit einer Person oder Sache einstehen
The definition in the German Wiktionary, in German.
Source: German Wiktionary, dump of September 1, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org.
Forms of bürgen
- bürgt present singular third-person
- bürgte past
- gebürgt participle past
- haben auxiliary
- bürgend participle present
- bürge first-person indicative present
- bürgst indicative present second-person
- bürgest second-person singular subjunctive
- bürget plural second-person subjunctive
- bürgten first-person indicative plural
- bürgtest indicative preterite second-person
- bürgtet indicative plural preterite
- bürg imperative second-person singular
- habe gebürgt first-person indicative multiword-construction
- haben gebürgt first-person indicative multiword-construction
- bürge! imperative singular
- bürgt! imperative plural
- gebürgt haben active infinitive perfect
Source: English Wiktionary and German Wiktionary (dumps of September 2, 2026 and September 1, 2026).
How common is bürgen in German?
bürgen appears 3.5 times per million words in written German.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).