Dutch/Lesson 6

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The Spanish general is led before Prince Maurits at Nieuwpoort

[edit] Gesprek 6

Jan: Zestienhonderd was de Slag bij Nieuwpoort, he mam?

Ma: Ja, jongen, heb je dat op school geleerd? En wat gebeurde er toen?

Jan: Prins Maurits versloeg de Spanjaarden, maar wat was er in zestienhonderdéén?

Ma: Eh nou, dat weet ik niet, hoor...

Jan: Het éénjarig bestaan van de Slag bij Nieuwpoort, natuurlijk.

[edit] Grammatica 6.1 ~ Numbers

The words in brackets are meant to help you with the pronunciation.

Dutch has a similar way of constructing the numbers for 13-19 as English, it is mainly the simple number (e.g. vijf, zes) followed by -tien, which means ten

13 dertien
14 veertien
15 vijftien
16 zestien
17 zeventien
18 achttien
19 negentien

Starting at twenty things get funny, Dutch puts the single unit before the ten-unit:

20 twintig
21 eenentwintig (literally: one-and-twenty)
22 tweeëntwintig
23 drieëntwintig
24 vierentwintig
25 vijfentwintig
26 zesentwintig
27 zevenentwintig
28 achtentwintig
29 negenentwintig

the same system for 30, 40, 50....

30 dertig
40 veertig
50 vijftig
60 zestig
70 zeventig
80 tachtig (!!)
90 negentig
100 honderd

Dutch does not use one in one hundred or one thousand

101 honderdéén
111 honderdelf
112 honderdtwaalf
113 honderddertien
121 honderdéénentwintig
957 negenhonderdzevenenvijftig

In Dutch all numbers lower than one thousand are written as one word. There should be a space after '1000' (duizend), though. There's also a space before and after: miljoen, biljoen, miljard, biljard, etc.

1000 duizend
1001 duizend één
1017 duizend zeventien
1538 duizend vijfhonderdachtendertig or vijftienhonderdachtendertig
2000 tweeduizend
8000 achtduizend

100.000 honderdduizend

143.000 honderddrieënveertigduizend

134.500 honderddrieënveertigduizend vijfhonderd

1.000.000 één miljoen

2.000.000 twee miljoen

453.897.245 vierhonderddrieënvijftig miljoen achthonderdzevenennegentigduizend tweehonderdvijfenveertig

1.000.000.000 één miljard

245.078.476.453.897 tweehonderdvijfenveertig biljoen achtenzeventig miljard vierhonderdzesenzeventig miljoen vierhonderddrieënvijftigduizend achthonderdnegenenzeventig

[edit] Grammatica 6.2 ~ Past and perfect tenses

Recall:

• ..heb je dat op school geleerd?...
• ..wat gebeurde er ...
• Maurits versloeg...

These are examples of past and perfect tenses. There are three kinds of verbs in Dutch when it comes to forming them.

1. Weak verbs add either -te(n) or -de(n) to the stem of the verb.
2. Strong verbs change the vowel of the stem.
3. Irregular verbs often have a combination of the two or show other idiosyncrasies.

[edit] Weak verbs

leren - to learn

ik leer - I learn → stem is leer

The past tense typically has a singular and a plural form:

ik, jij, hij leerde - I, you, he learned

wij, jullie, zij leerden - we, you, they learned

The perfect uses an auxiliary + the past participle. It is formed by prefixing ge- and suffixing -d in this case:

the perfect

ik heb geleerd - I have learned

The auxiliary is usually a form of hebben (to have, see below), but it can also be from zijn (to be).
The participle is put at the end of the sentence:

Ik heb dat op school geleerd.

If the verb already has a prefix like be- or ver-, the ge- prefix is omitted:

Wat bedoel je? - What do you mean?

Ik heb dat zo niet bedoeld. - I did not mean it that way.

Wat gebeurt er?

Wat gebeurde er?

Wat is er gebeurd?

(Notice that gebeuren (to happen) takes zijn (to be))

If the root ends in a voiceless consonant (t, k, f, s, ch, p and x) the endings are voiceless -te, -ten, -t:

passen - to pass

ik pas - I pass → stem is pas

ik paste - I passed

ik heb gepast - I have passed

put the following weak verbs in the past tense

[edit] Strong verbs

lopen - to walk (leap)

Ik loop - I walk

Ik liep - I walked (notice the vowel change)

Ik heb gelopen

The participle ends in -en in the case of strong verbs.

There are more than 150 strong roots and including all derived forms lopen, belopen, verlopen etc. there are more than 500 strong verbs in Dutch. There are seven distinct patterns of vowel change. We will come back to that later, but fortunately for all Dutch verbs except a handful it is enough to memorize de stamtijden (the primitive times):

lopen-liep-gelopen (infinitive - past tense - past participle)

Lopen is a verb of movement. This is why is often uses to be as auxiliary. Compare:

Ik heb altijd veel gelopen - I always did a lot of walking

Ik ben naar huis gelopen - I walked home

Notice that Dutch often uses the perfect tense where English uses a simple past. The past tense corresponds more to the past continuous in English, although the division of labor between the tenses is different in the two languages.

Ik liep naar huis - I was walking home

The past of some of the strong verbs has a plural that undergoes lengthening of the vowel:

breken-brak-gebroken

ik brak (as in father)

wij braken (as in Gaad)

(Thus the verb has four stages of vowel change. This is is a very ancient aspect of the language. It stems straight out of Indo-European. Anglo-Saxon had something similar.)

[edit] Past continuous

Dutch does not have a past (or present) continuous as such, although there is a construction using aan het + infinitive that can be used to describe continuity rather emphatically:

Ik was naar huis aan het lopen, toen ik hem zag

I was (busy) walking home when I saw him

Verbs like lopen, staan, zitten, liggen (walk, stand, sit and lie) can also be used to express continuous action. They take te + infinitive:

Ik zat te denken - I was thinking (while sitting)

Ik stond te bellen - I was on the phone (while standing)

[edit] Irregular verbs

There are only a few verbs (actually 6) that demand more knowledge than that which is contained in the three stamtijden (primitive tenses)

They are: zijn, hebben, zullen, mogen, kunnen and willen

[edit] The auxiliary to have

The most important irregular verbs are hebben en zijn:

hebben-had-gehad

hebben - to have

ik heb - I have

jij hebt - you have

hij heeft - he has

wij, jullie, zij hebben - we, you, they have

[edit] Past tense

ik, jij, hij had - I, you, he had

wij, jullie, zij hadden - we, you, they had

[edit] Perfect

ik heb gehad

[edit] The auxiliary to be

zijn-was-geweest

zijn, wezen - to be

ik ben - I am

jij bent - you are

hij is - he is

wij, jullie, zij zijn - we,you,they are

[edit] Past tense

ik was

wij waren

[edit] Perfect

ik ben geweest - I have been

[edit] other irregular verbs

Of course there are a few more irregular verbs. We have seen one:

verslaan

ik versla

ik versloeg

ik heb verslagen

In this case it is enough to know the three stamtijden. As this is the case for all Dutch verbs bar six it is customary to represent a verb whether weak, strong or irregular by these primitive tenses.

[edit] Woordenschat 6

de school                        school
het jaar                         year
jarig zijn                       having a birthday
de slag                          blow, battle
de natuur                        nature
de jongen                        boy
natuurlijk                       naturally, of course

schrijven-schreef-geschreven s   to write   
lezen-las-gelezen s              to read 
leren-leerde-geleerd w           to learn, to teach
bedoelen-bedoelde-bedoeld w      to mean, to aim at
lopen-liep-gelopen s             to walk
bestaan-bestond-bestaan irr      to exist
zijn-was-geweest irr             to be
hebben-had-gehad irr             to have
weten-wist-geweten irr           to know
zien-zag-gezien irr              to see
zwemmen-zwom-gezwommen s         to swim
vinden-vond-gevonden s           to find
eten-at-gegeten irr              to eat 
zitten-zat-gezeten s             to sit 
denken-dacht-gedacht irr         to think  
slapen-sliep-geslapen s          to sleep

Also see Dutch/The numbers for a synopsis and the hover test based on it.