Articles in German. The use of articles in German: about der, die, das again

Articles in German have important grammatical functions. They express gender, number, case and the category of definiteness and indeterminacy of the noun they precede.

Types of articles

German language articles divides in three categories: singular der or ein- for the masculine gender, das or ein– for average, die or eine– for feminine and for plural – article die.

Articles der, das, die – certain And ein, eine – uncertain. The category of certainty says that the subject being discussed is isolated from many similar things and is known to the interlocutors, i.e. contextual or unique.

The indefinite article in German carries novelty information about an object in a given context, introduces interlocutors to a new object that has appeared in the field of communication and is replaced in repeated use by a definite article. For example:

Ich sehe da ein Mädchen. Das Mädchen weint.
I see (some) girl there. She's crying.

It is easy to see what shades of information both articles convey: in the first case, the girl has just appeared in our context, we do not know her yet, she is one of many for us, some kind of girl in other words. In the second sentence we already use definite article in German, because we continue to talk about that girl, the specific girl who is standing there, so in the translation we can easily replace the word “das Mädchen” simply with the word “she”, since it is already clear who we are talking about.

German article table

It is very important to understand the logic when the subject is not yet defined and when it already becomes defined, i.e. acquaintances, in each specific situation, otherwise even misunderstandings may arise in communicating with Germans. You cannot use only definite or indefinite articles, both of them carry their own grammatical and semantic functions and loads in the language system. Therefore, for clarity, below German article table to begin with, in the nominative case (who? what?).

Declension of articles in German by case

We use the nominative case when we answer the question “who?”, “what?”, i.e. we call an object, in other words, it itself produces an action, being a subject. If the action is directed at an object, and it acts as the object of this action, then the noun begins to change according to cases. Declension of articles in German is unthinkable without the participation of the article, unlike in Russian, where the very form of the word changes due to the ending or other methods of word formation. Therefore, as “Our Father” you need to know the following tables of declination of articles:

Declension of the definite article

Declension of the indefinite article

* Since the indefinite article ein came from the numeral eins= one, then in the plural ein is inappropriate, but according to a similar pattern the negative is declined kein= none, for plural – keine= none.

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Article in German

An article is a function word that comes before a noun. The article in German is declined and indicates to us the gender, number and case of the noun. In German there are definite articles die, der, das, die(plural) and indefinite ein, eine, ein. The indefinite article does not exist in the plural.

Declension of the definite and indefinite articles in German

The possessive pronouns mein, dein, sein, ihr, unser, euer and the negative pronoun are declined as the indefinite article kein in singular parts, used instead of the article.
Demonstrative pronouns are inflected like the definite article. dieser- this, diese - this, these, diesels - This ; jenes - That, jener- That, jene - ta, those ; solcher- such, solche - such, such, solches - such an interrogative pronoun welcher- Which? welche - which? which? welches - which?

Using the indefinite article in German

Use of the definite article in German

Using the zero article in German

An article in German is a special part of speech that accompanies a noun. For many people starting to learn German, a very important part of speech - the article - is incomprehensible. There is no analogue in Russian for this part of speech. But in order to understand at least a little the importance of articles in the German language, you first need to understand why they are needed and what function they play.

In Russian we say: dogs A, dogs at, from dogs Ouch and so on.

In German, we can say that the role of our ending is played by the article. It shows the gender, case and number of the noun.

For example:

These are dogs A. - Das ist ein Hund.
I see dogs at- Ich sehe einen Hund.
He goes for a walk With dogs Ouch. - Er geht mit dem Hund spazieren.

As you may have noticed, endings do not change in German. Articles are used instead of endings. The German article is placed directly before a noun. If there is a definition before the noun, the article is placed before the definition.

Das ist ein interessantes Buch. - It's an interesting book.

What articles are there in German?

There are 4 types of articles in German:

indefinite article

definite article

zero article

negative article

Table of declination of the definite and indefinite article

There are four cases (Kasus) in German:

Nominative (nominative) wer? was? - Who? What?

Akkusativ (accusative) wen? was? - whom? What?

Dativ (dative) wem? welcher Sache? - to whom? what?

Genitiv (genitive) wessen? - whom? what?

In this table you see the forms of the definite and indefinite article for the masculine, neuter, feminine and plural. Please note that there is no indefinite article in the plural. The definite article in the plural is the same for all genders - DIE.

All nouns in German are writtencapitalized And used withuncertain or definitearticle. Sometimes the article is not used.

In German, the article not only gives information about the definiteness/indeterminacy of the noun, but also indicates the gender, number and case of the noun, bowing .

When to use which article?

On our website there is an opportunity pronunciation there is any German text. To do this simply highlight German text or a word anywhere on our site And click the "Play" button at the bottom right(white triangle in black circle). You will then hear the text spoken in German.

Indefinite article has the following forms:

ein- for the masculine singular - ein Hund (dog)
ein- for the neuter singular - ein Loch (hole)
eine- for the feminine singular - eine Maus (mouse)

But don't forget that these articles are inflected. If you forgot, look again at the article declination table.

In the plural, designations for unspecified persons or objects are used without an article.

Indefinite article ein or eine used

• with nouns, which we call for the first time:

Möchten Sie eine Banana? - Do you want ( one) banana?

Das ist ein Buch. - This is a book.
Das Buch ist sehr interessant. - This book is very interesting.

• after the verb haben if the noun is in the accusative case.

Ich habe einen Hund und eine Katze. -
I have ( one) dog and ( one) cat.

• after a speech turn es gibt(there is, there is)

In meiner Stadt gibt es einen Schönen Park und ein Theater. -
In my city there is (is available) ( one) beautiful park and ( one) theater.

• when there is a comparison and the conjunction wie (like) is used:

Sie singt wie ein Vogel. - She sings like a bird.

Definite article has the following forms:

der- for the masculine singular - der Hund (dog)
das- for the neuter singular - das Loch (hole)
die- for feminine singular - die Maus (mouse)
die- for the plural - die Hunde (dogs)

Definite article der, die or das used

• with nouns that we know, which we are not talking about for the first time.

Mmm, die Banane ist le cker. - Mmm, ( this) banana is delicious.

Das ist ein Buch. - This is a book.
Das Buch ist sehr interessant. - This book is very interesting.

• when talking about a subject, the only possible in this situation:

Ist der Director schon da? - Is the director already here?

Mein Kind kommt bald aus der Schule. - My child will come home from school soon.

Director at the company one, and the school the child goes to, too one.

• when talking about the only subject of a kind:

a) names of celestial bodies:

die Sonne - sun
der Mond - moon, month
die Erde - Earth
die Venus - Venus
der Merkur - Mercury, etc.;

b) names of countries of the world, seasons, months and days of the week:

der Norden - north
der Sommer - summer
der Januar - January
der Montag - Monday, etc.;

In combination Anfang, Ende, Mitte The article is not used with the name of the month:

Anfang Januar fahren wir ins Gebirge. - At the beginning of January we are going to the mountains.

c) names of oceans, seas, rivers, lakes, for example:

der Stille Ozean - Pacific Ocean
das Schwarze Meer - Black Sea
der Don - Don
der Ladoga-See - Lake Ladoga;

d) names of streets, squares, avenues:

der Newski-Prospekt
der Roßplatz
die Käthe-Kolwitz-Straße, etc.;

e) names of mountains, winds, deserts:

der Ural - Ural
der Nordost - north-east
die Sahara - Sugar, etc.;

• with a superlative adjective or ordinal number:

die klügste Antwort - the smartest answer
der erste Schnee - first snow;

Use zero article You just have to memorize it!

• The article is missing when uncountable nouns And abstract concepts are something that cannot be touched or seen.

For example: Zeit- time, Lust- wish, Glück- happiness, Hunger- hunger and similar words.

It’s true, it’s impossible to calculate!

Ich habe Zeit- I have time.
Ich habe Hunger- I am hungry.

Also used without an article

• professions :

Ich bin Arzt- I am a doctor.
Meine Freundin ist Informatikerin. - My friend is a computer scientist.
Er ist Student. - He is a student.

nationality

Ich bin Russin. - I'm Russian.
Sie ist Spanierin. - She's Spanish.
Sie sind Chinese. - They are Chinese.

• religious affiliations

Ich bin Catholic. - I am Catholic.
Seid Ihr Buddhisten? -Are you Buddhists?
Sie sind Christen. - They are Christians.

• names of cities, countries and continents:

Ich komme aus Germany. - I am from Germany.
In einem Monat fahre ich nach Kiev. - In a month I will go to Kyiv.

Exceptions: die Schweiz (Switzerland), die Türkei (Turkey), die USA (USA), der Iran (Iran), die Niederlande (Netherlands) and others

materials and substances:

das Haus aus Holz- house made of wood
die Tasche aus Leder- leather bag
Trinken Sie Kaffee germ? - Do you like coffee?

diseases:

Ich habe Grippe. - I have the flu.
Er hat Fieber. - He has a fever.

in plural, if a singular noun is used with an indefinite article (the absence of an article indicates an indefinite set of named objects):

Da steht ein Haus. - Here is the house.
Da stehen Hauser. - Here are the houses.

We strongly recommend that you learn German nouns immediately with articles, since articles play an important role in the correct construction of sentences. For example, learn the word “lamp” not as “Lampe”, but as “die Lampe”.

In addition to the definite and indefinite articles, the German language also has a number of pronouns that carry information about the gender, number and case of the noun. These are demonstrative pronouns (dieser - this, jener - that, etc.), possessive pronouns (mein - mine, dein - yours, etc.) and a negative pronoun (negative article) kein. Such pronouns are used instead of the article and are declined as a definite or indefinite article.

Demonstrative pronouns are also declined like the definite article. dieser - this, jener - that, solcher - such is the interrogative pronoun

Everything is much more complicated.

There is an article here der for masculine nouns, die- for women, das- for average and die- for plural nouns. But the form of these articles varies depending on the context, and they sometimes take the form dem or den.

Don't be alarmed - with a fair amount of practice, you will begin to understand how to use articles on an intuitive level (at least that's what I reassure myself).

Top tip for learning der, die and das: remember nouns along with articles!

And now to the rules.

Although the use of der, die and das before each noun seems completely haphazard, there is still a certain logic:

• If the word ends in -or, -ling, -smus or -ig, the masculine article is always used with it der, as with the words der Tor (gate), der Feigling (cow), der Journalismus (journalism) and der Honig (honey), respectively.
• If the word ends in -ung, -keit, -schaft, –tät, -ik, -tion, -heit or -ei, the feminine article is always used with it die. For example, die Ahnung (idea), die Möglichkeit (opportunity), die Wissenschaft (science), die Qualität (quality), die Semantik (semantics), die Situation (situation), die Dunkelheit (darkness) and die Bäckerei (bakery).
• Very often (though not always) words ending in -e also used with the article die, such as die Lampe (lamp).
• Article die always used with plural nouns (except for the dative case, which we will return to later).
• If the word ends in -chen, -ma, -um, -ment, -lein or -tum, then the article is used with it das, as in das Würstchen (sausage), das Schema (scheme), das Christentum (Christianity), das Medikament (medicine), das Fräulein (lady) and das Eigentum (property).
• Article das also often used with technical, mechanical and scientific nouns.

At least now you have something to focus on. True, there are still many German words with other endings. Unfortunately, you can only find out their gender and, accordingly, which article to use with them using a dictionary.

Things get more complicated when you encounter any case other than the nominative case.

Accusative case (Akkusativ)

In the accusative case, article der changes to den. Fortunately, the rest of the articles remain the same.

Let's see how it works. To make everything very clear with gender, let's talk about men and women. Let’s take the sentence “A woman hit a man” (Let’s make it clear that we do not encourage violence of any kind, but sometimes it happens, right?)

“Man” is of course masculine, der Mann, and “woman” is feminine, die Frau. Since a woman beats a man (oh, crazy world!), the accusative case takes place. Remember: the only article that changes in the accusative case is the masculine article. As a result, we get the following: Die Frau schlug den Mann.

Dative case (Dativ)

If the noun in the sentence is in the dative case, then the article changes again: der on dem, die on der, das on dem And die for plural of den.

Let's look at a few examples to make things fall into place.

“I waited in line for five hours.”
The noun "queue" in German is feminine, die Schlange. Because in the dative case die becomes der, then the sentence will be as follows:
Ich habe fünf Stunden in der Schlange gewärtet.

Another example: “The glass is on the table.”
The masculine noun der Tisch (table) is in the dative case. So the sentence comes out as follows:
Der Becher ist auf dem Tisch.

"Oranges under the sofa." (How did they get there?!)
In the dative case, the article of the neuter noun das Sofa will change to dem. The entire proposal would be as follows:
Die Orange sind unter dem Sofa.

Genitive case

Belonging to someone or something can be expressed using the preposition von: das Auto von Tom (Tom's car).

But in writing it is better to use the genitive case, in which the articles change as follows: der to des, die to der, das to des And die for the plural of der eg: das Kleid der Frau "woman's dress", das Auto des Mannes "man's car". (When everyone gets what they need, there's no need to fight, right?)

Well, you can breathe out. It's not that bad. Remember that the article in many cases depends on the ending of the noun, learn these endings and practice, practice and practice again.

And repeat like a mantra: “100 million German speakers have mastered this. And I can do it too.”

Instructions

Use the definite article in the following cases:

When the subject being spoken about is known to both the speaker and the listener. For example: Das Kind ist gleich eingeschlafen;
- when the subject is the only possible one in a given situation or of its kind, or is somehow highlighted (defined in a sentence). For example: Die Erde bewegt sich um die Sonne;
- with the names of rivers, lakes, seas, oceans, mountains, streets, for example: der Stille Ozean;
- collective meaning, for example: Die Gesellschaft hat sich geändert.

The indefinite article should be used in cases where:

An item from a series of similar ones. For example: Hast du ein Worterbuch?;
- the noun is the nominal part of the nominal predicate. For example: Zeuthen ist eine Stadt in Deutschland;
- the noun acts as a direct object after haben (to have) and es gibt (there is, there is). For example: Es gibt hier ein Geschenk.

There is no article (zero article) when:

The noun is plural and denotes an indefinite number of objects. For example: Hast du weichen Spielzeuge?;
- a noun denotes material or substance. For example: Ich bevorzuge Kaffee;
- a noun denotes a property, quality or state. For example: Sie haben Hunger;
- a noun is a nominal part of a compound nominal predicate and expresses professional, social and other similar affiliation. For example: Ich bin Artz;
- a noun is a nominal part of a compound nominal predicate and denotes a temporary. For example: Es ist Freitag;
- the noun follows the preposition ohne (without) or the conjunction als (as, as). For example: Mein Kind liest ohne Hilfe.

Sources:

• definite article in German
• Rules for determining the article in German

Articles exist in many European and Asian languages. They are definite and indefinite. Every student of Romance and Germanic languages ​​faces the need to distinguish between them. These short words can appear before or after nouns, either singular or plural. To correctly convey the meaning of a foreign phrase, you need to know how one article differs from another and when which one is used.

You will need

• - text in a foreign language.

Instructions

Having received the task of translating a piece of text or composing a story yourself, remember what articles it contains. There are two of them, a and the. The article a is called definite, the - indefinite. The secret to using them lies in the . If you are talking about something that has already been mentioned before, use the article a. The same applies to situations if, in a conversation with an interlocutor, you name a very specific and, moreover, known to you object. In opposite situations, put the.

Try to answer the question about what kind of flower or pencil we are talking about. If the words “some”, “any”, “unknown” can be placed in front of a noun, then we are talking about “an object in general”. In this case, the indefinite article is used. Definite is used if an object can be designated as “this”, “that same”, “the one that I showed you”, “the one that we have already talked about”.

In a number of languages, articles are used in both singular and number. In Romance languages ​​they also have a gender category. But they are distinguished in the same way as in. The Spanish un, una, unos and unas come from the Latin numeral for one. Before nouns you can put the words “one of”, “some”, “some” in the appropriate gender. If you see the words el, la, los and las before nouns, this indicates that this item or items have already been discussed before or the interlocutors know about them.

In some languages, it is the articles that make it possible to distinguish, which often sound exactly the same and their exact meaning can only be established by belonging to a certain gender. In a language, singular and plural nouns sometimes sound exactly the same. The number can be determined by a short word that comes before the main one. Le and les sound different. Listen carefully to foreign speech and catch the sound that ends this small but important part of speech.

You may not be understood if you start using nouns without articles. In many cases, only this modest part of speech allows us to determine what is being said about the noun. Nothing like that before adjectives and verbs. It happens that verbs look and sound exactly the same as nouns. The absence of an article can greatly change the meaning of a phrase, often even to the exact opposite. Therefore, before you say a phrase, remember whether you have ever talked about this subject before or not.

Look at the entire offer. If there are any details about a given object, there may be a definite article before it. For example, if you need to translate the phrase “there is a tree growing in front of the house,” then in both cases you put a or, say, un. It can be said about a house that it is located on such and such a street and there is just a tree growing in front of it. In this case, the article before the word “house” in almost any Western European language will be definite. The tree remains unknown, somehow, “a tree in general.” If, for example, it has a broken top or a forked trunk, the situation changes. This is a tree you already know, unlike any other. That's why el or the comes before it.

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