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Words for objects without obvious masculine or feminine characteristics like 'bridge' or 'rock' can be masculine or feminine. German nouns are declined (change form) depending on their grammatical case (their function in a sentence) and whether they are singular or plural. German has four cases: nominative, accusative, dative and genitive.
Aal - eel; aalen - to stretch out; aalglatt - slippery; Aas - carrion/rotting carcass; aasen - to be wasteful; Aasgeier - vulture; ab - from; abarbeiten - to work off/slave away
Singular forms simply remove the final s or, in the case of -ese endings, are the same as the plural forms. The ending -men has feminine equivalent -women (e.g. Irishman , Scotswoman ). The French terminations -ois / -ais serve as both the singular and plural masculine ; adding e ( -oise / -aise ) makes them singular feminine; es ( -oises ...
The genitive plural, however is hjartna showing a-breaking instead of u-breaking. Some borrowings may exhibit similar behaviour, e.g, singular drama, plural drömu. Most of these are words for organs. An almost exhaustive list of neuter weak nouns follows: auga (eye) bjúga (a type of sausage) eista (testicle) eyra (ear) hjarta (heart)
German articles and pronouns in the genitive and dative cases directly indicate the actions of owning and giving without needing additional words (indeed, this is their function), which can make German sentences appear confusing to English-speaking learners.
The weak inflection is used when there is a definite word in place (der [die, das, des, den, dem], jed-, jen-, manch-, dies-, solch-and welch-). The definite word has provided most of the necessary information, so the adjective endings are simpler. The endings are applicable to every degree of comparison (positive, comparative, and superlative).
All German nouns are included in one of three grammatical genders: masculine, feminine or neuter. While the gender often does not directly influence the plural forms of nouns, [1] [2] there are exceptions, particularly when it comes to people and professions (e.g. Ärzte/Ärztinnen).
The etymological spelling -ti- for the sounds [tsɪ̯] before vowels is used in many words of Latin origin, mostly ending in -tion , but also -tiell, -tiös , etc. Latin -tia in feminine nouns is typically simplified to -z in German; in related words, both -ti- and -zi- are allowed: Potenz 'power' (from Latin potentia), Potential/Potenzial ...