Projects and how they end

The word in this list with the longest memory is der Abgesang. It comes from the vocabulary of the Meistersinger, the guild poets of the late Middle Ages. A stanza in their song form opened with two matching parts, each called a Stollen, which together made up the Aufgesang; then came a differently built closing part, the Abgesang. So the word first named the section that brings a stanza to its end, not a lament. Today it is used of anything seen in its final phase — ein Abgesang auf das Großprojekt, a farewell to the grand scheme — and it carries a verdict: whoever writes one has decided the thing is over, sometimes before those running it have. The rest of the list follows a project from der Startschuss to that point, and collects the many ways of stopping that stop short of saying so.