Anlegung

Anlegung is a German noun formed from the verb anlegen. It denotes the act or process of laying out, establishing, or placing something. In historical and formal contexts the term often refers to the laying out or founding of a settlement, infrastructure, or landscape, as in die Anlegung einer neuen Siedlung or die Anlegung einer Straße. In this sense it is close to Gründung, Errichtung or Planung, but emphasizes the act of laying out or establishing rather than the completed object.

A second domain is economics and finance, where Anlegung describes the process of investing or deploying capital. In older or formal texts one may encounter formulations such as die Anlegung von Kapital or die Anlegung eines Portfolios; in contemporary usage the more common noun is Anlage, or the verb investieren.

In biology and other technical fields the related term Anlage is more widely used for the rudimentary formation of organs or structures; Anlegung is comparatively rare and typically restricted to specific technical or historical contexts.

The term is more common in written, formal, or historical language than in everyday colloquial German, and it occurs mainly in compound nouns or in legal, planning, or archival texts.