PUTSCH: a secretly plotted and suddenly executed attempt to overthrow a government
In its native Swiss German, Putsch originally meant "knock" or "thrust," but these days it's used in both German and English to refer to the kind of government overthrow also known as a coup d'etat. "Putsch" debuted in English in June of 1920, just three months after the tumultuous Kapp Putsch, in which Wolfgang Kapp and his right-wing supporteres attempted to overthrow the German Weimar government. Putsch attempts were common in Weimar Germany, so the word appeard often in the stories of the English journalists who described the insurrections. In 1923, Adolf Hitler himself attempted a putsch (known as the Beer Hall Putsch), but he ultimately gained control of the German government via other means.
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