German adjective declension is really not that complicated most of the time, and I say that as a native English speaker for whom declension was once a totally alien concept.
Der heiße Kaffee steht in der kleinen Küche. Die laute Musik kommt aus dem großen Zimmer. Das weinende Kind gehört der fröhlichen Frau. (The hot coffee is in the small kitchen.) – der Kaffee = masculine, nominative der Küche = feminine, dative Der heiß_ Kaffee steht in der klein_ Küche. (The loud music comes from the large room.) – die Musik = feminine, nominative dem Zimmer = neuter, dativeĥ. Die laut_ Musik kommt aus dem groß_ Zimmer. (The crying child belongs to the cheerful woman.) – das Kind = neuter, nominative der Frau = feminine, dativeĤ. Das weinend_ Kind gehört der fröhlich_ Frau. (The colorful toy belongs to the little boy.) das Spielzeug = neuter, nominative dem Jungen = masculine, dativeģ. Das bunt_ Spielzeug gehört dem klein_ Jungen. (The pretty woman is kissing the smart man.) – die Frau = feminine, nominative den Mann = masculine, accusativeĢ. You can also see that you have to decline the noun according to gender and case.Įxercise: Now it’s time again to practice what you have just learned.
GERMAN ADJECTIVE ENDINGS HOW TO
The following table shows how to decline adjectives in German when a “der Wort” precedes the adjective.Īs you can see, all adjectives following a der word in the dative and genitive case or in the plural take the ending –en. Words that limit the ‘full’ declension of adjectives are so-called “der Wörter” (der words), which are articles and such. Because of that, the adjective takes the so-called weak ending –e/-en. Hence the ending of the following adjective does not need to reflect this information (because this job is already carried out by the preceding “limiting word”.
These “limiting words” perform the task of expressing gender and grammatical function (case). Words that precede adjectives are called “limiting words”. In such sentence constructions you have to decline the adjective.Īdjectives can take different endings depending on the type of word that precedes them. Unfortunately, things are getting more complicated when you want to put the adjective before the noun, for example, saying something like “The nice man”, etc. You learned that there is no need to decline adjectives in so-called “to be” sentences or, in other words, when you put the adjective after the noun. In my last post I began to talk about forming simple sentences with adjectives in German.