de kat (the cat)
het meisje (the girl)
de jongen (the boy)
de vrouw (the woman)
de straten (the streets)
het boek (the book)
het kind (the child)
de bloem (the flower)
de katten (the cats)
het gebouw (the building)
Most nouns will have the “de” article, which is “the” in English. Ex: de man (the man)
All plural nouns are “de”. Ex: de huizen (houses)
All singular diminutives are “het.” Ex: het tafeltje (the little table)
All plural diminutives are “de”. Ex: de huisjes (the little houses)
Here’s a little exercise to test whether you know the articles. You can post your answers in the comment section.
_ kat
_ meisje
_ jongen
_ vrouw
_ straten
- boek
_ kind
_ bloem
_ katten
_ gebouw
I’ll provide the answers to the last post, and the link so that you can hear the word and see a sample sentence of the word being used.
1) geraamte (skeleton). Link: http://www.transparent.com/wotd/today/dutch.htm?date=05-01-2009
2) goudsmid (goldsmith). Link: http://www.transparent.com/wotd/today/dutch.htm?date=05-02-2009
3) hangslot (padlock). Link: http://www.transparent.com/wotd/today/dutch.htm?date=05-03-2009
4) hommel (bumblebee). Link: http://www.transparent.com/wotd/today/dutch.htm?date=05-04-2009
5) ijsvogel (kingfisher). Link: http://www.transparent.com/wotd/today/dutch.htm?date=05-05-2009
6) jukbeen (cheekbone). Link: http://www.transparent.com/wotd/today/dutch.htm?date=05-06-2009
7) kapmes (machete). Link: http://www.transparent.com/wotd/today/dutch.htm?date=05-07-2009
knoopsgat (buttonhole). Link: http://www.transparent.com/wotd/today/dutch.htm?date=05-08-2009
9) studeren (to study). Link: http://www.transparent.com/wotd/today/dutch.htm?date=05-09-2009
10) schaatsen (to skate). Link: http://www.transparent.com/wotd/today/dutch.htm?date=05-10-2009
I’m going to create a word search puzzle so that everyone will get the opportunity to study Dutch words. The words are from the Dutch “Word of the Day” at Transparent Language. I now present you the clues:
1) means “skeleton” in Dutch
2) “goldsmith” in Dutch
3) “padlock” in Dutch
4) bumblebee in Dutch
5) kingfisher in Dutch
6) cheekbone in Dutch
7) machete in Dutch
buttonhole in Dutch
9) “to study” in Dutch
10) “to skate” in Dutch
G O U D S M I D I X S V I T E
H T A Y Y N E N J G E Q Z T Y
R A K P O U P S S Y M G M K B
B Y N L R H E G V B P A D A W
Z Y A G W B V I O H A C N C R
E T C P S Y C E G R K R E W G
D Y A A J L T T E V D S S T R
I C Z G F L O G L P T D T M T
V A J A S P E T K U K K A D V
F W E K P P X M D X Y A A T C
K Q Z P R C O E M H Z C H D I
Q A Z F V X R O G O Z F C C Z
E O P C B E P L N S H V S K V
I C S W N N E E B K U J O R Q
N Q O R Q B H V L F J D C Q B
I’ve always planned to do a post on Dutch syllables, but I’ve never quite remembered to do it. Well, today is a different story. I’ve put together some notes on Dutch syllables. Hopefully someone will find this useful.
Rule #1: When two vowels are separated by one consonant, that consonant forms the beginning of the second syllable. For example, the Dutch word maken (to make) can be broken up into ma-ken.
Rule #2 : If a vowel is separated by more than one consonant, the first syllable gets one consonant, and the second syllable gets the rest of the consonants. So with a word like paarden (horses), it can be separated into syllables as paar-den.
Rule #3 : Prefixes are always separate from the other syllables of a word. For example, besturen (to steer, to reign) is divided like this: be-stu-ren. Gebruiken (to use) is ge-brui-ken, and ontaarden (to degenerate) is ont-aar-den.
Rule #4 : The suffix ische and sche is counted as one consonant. Therefore any letters before this suffix will be a different syllable from ische/sche. An example of this is with the Dutch word for Belgian, which can be divided into Bel-gi-sche.
Rule #5 : The dieresis, which is a punctuation called an umlaut in German, and looks like this ä. In this case the two dots above the a is the dieresis. The dieresis can help you divide Dutch words into syllables. Take a look at the Dutch word for selfish: e-go-ïs-tisch.
