Let’s look at what happens when the definite article is still around. When an article is present, however, the adjective doesn’t need to do as much work. You should also use a strong adjective ending after a number (greater than one) with no definite article: drei blind e Mäuse (“three blind mice”). The strong endings are also used with the following words, which also don’t provide any gender or case information on their own:įor example: mehr schlecht es Wetter – “more bad weather.” The -es carries the same gender and case information that was previously provided by das. Without the article, this information is lost – so the adjective picks it back up, as in kalt es Wasser. When it comes to strong endings, there’s no article at all, so the adjective has to carry all the gender and case information.įor example: In the noun phrase das Wasser, we know from the das that the noun is a) neuter and b) either nominative or accusative. Think about it like this: the adjective ending tells you the information about the noun’s gender and case that isn’t provided by the article. The only one that doesn’t follow the nice, logical pattern is des, which becomes -en. Most of the time, you just have to remove the d- or di- from the beginning of the article. The adjective ending at each point on the table is similar to the corresponding definite article:
Compare the table of strong adjective endings to the table of definite articles from above. This might seem like a lot to take in, but there’s a method to the madness. Masculine Neuter Feminine Plural Nominative -er -es -e -e Accusative -en -es -e -e Dative -em -em -er -en Genitive -en -en -er -er Here’s a useful chart of German definite articles – that is, the different ways in German to say “the”. The Fluent in 3 Months (Fi3M) guide to German articles has a great summary of noun cases in German. You’ll want to have a basic understanding of German noun cases before diving too deeply into German adjective endings. Second, each occurence of a German noun has a case: nominative, accusative, dative or genitive – which conveys information about the role the noun plays in the sentence. Speaking of nouns, I can’t get too far talking about adjectives without a quick review of German nouns first – that’s because choosing the right adjective ending depends a lot on the noun that it’s describing.įirst, [every German noun has a gender: masculine, feminine or neuter. A phrase like “the German language” would be die deutsche Sprache in German. Just like in English, German adjectives go before the noun: “the black dog” is der schwarze Hund.īut unlike in English, German adjectives are almost never capitalised, even when they refer to a proper noun. Using the Correct Endings for German Adjectives: A Final Tip to Remember German Adjective Endings: Let’s Review the Base.German Adjective Endings: Let’s Review the Base.
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