The grammatical genders of German nouns seem to be a pain in the neck for most foreign learners of German. Therefore, I would like to give you some hints whether a particular noun can be masculine, feminine or neuter in German. Subsequent to my two previous posts I will continue with masculine German nouns.

In my two last posts you learned that all nouns are masculine, which match the following features. German nouns are masculine when they denote:

–       a male human  –       a male animal –       a male occupation –       an animal species –       a mineral or stone

–       a season of the year  –       a month –       a day of the week –       a daytime –       a point of the compass

 

a)    Winds, precipitation, weather phenomena

Whenever you will talk about the weather you can be sure that the nouns you would like to use in your speech are masculine.

der Wind – wind  der Taifun – typhoon der Sturm – storm der Hurrikan – hurricane der Orkan – hurricane der Tornado – tornado der Regen – rain

der Schnee – snow  der Monsun – monsoon der Hagel – hail der Nebel – fog der Donner – thunder der Blitz – lighning der Niederschlag – precipitation

 

Exceptions are: das Wetter – weather / die Brise – breeze / das Gewitter – thunderstorm

 

b) The following five nouns that end with “–ee”

der Kaffee – coffee

der Tee – tea

der See – lake

der Schnee – snow

der Klee – clover

Please note well that the German word “See” can also refer to the ‘sea’, but only when you replace the article “der” with “die”. Hence, “der See” means “the lake” and “die See” means “the sea”, for example: die Ostsee = the Baltic Sea; die Nordsee = the North Sea.

 

b)   Brand names of cars and types of trains

Brand names of cars and types of train are usually masculine, regardless whether you are talking about German cars and trains or foreign ones.

der Audi  der Opel der BMW der Fiat der Renault der Ford der Volkswagen (VW) der Mercedes der Volvo

der Chevrolet  der Ferrari der Porsche der Güterzug – freighttrain der TGV (French train) der ICE (German high-speed train) der Acela Express (American high-speed train)

 

c)    Names for currencies

The majority of the world’s currencies are masculine in German.

der Dollar – dollar  der Euro – euro der Rubel – ruble der Peso – peso der Franc – franc der Real – real

der Dinar – dinar  der Lew – lev der Rial – rial der Yen – yen der Schilling – shilling der Zloty – zloty

 

Exceptions are: die Mark – mark / die Krone – krone / die Rupie – rupee / die Lira – lira

 

To be continued…