# Dutch/Lesson 6

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* Beginner level: cycle 2
Lesson 6 ~ Lesson 6
Geschiedenis ~ History
* • Grammar: More numerals
* • Grammar: The past tense
* • The perfect tenses
* • Inseparable verbs
* • To have and to be

## Gesprek 6

Vocabulary :
| de slag | battle |
| leren | to learn |
| gebeuren | to happen |
| toen | then |
| verslaan | to defeat |
| eenjarig | pertaining to one year |
| bestaan | to exist |
Jan: Zestienhonderd was de Slag bij Nieuwpoort, he mam?
       The Battle of Nieuwpoort was in 1600, wasn't it mom?
Ma: Ja, jongen, heb je dat op school geleerd? En wat gebeurde er toen?
       Yes, dear, did you learn that in school? And what happened then?
Jan: Prins Maurits versloeg de Spanjaarden, maar wat was er in zestienhonderdenéén?
       Prince Maurice (of Orange) beat the Spanish, but what happened in 1601?
Ma: Eh nou, dat weet ik niet, hoor...
       Well, eh, that I don't know...
Jan: Het éénjarig bestaan van de Slag bij Nieuwpoort, natuurlijk.
       Well, the first anniversary of the Battle of Nieuwpoort, of course.

## Grammatica 6.1 ~ Numbers

Use the sound buttons to help you with the pronunciation.

### -teen = -tien

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" and is very similar to English -teen
13 dertien
14 veertien
15 vijftien
16 zestien
17 zeventien
18 achttien
19 negentien

### -ty = -tig

As another example of the relationship between English y versus Dutch g, the English ending -ty in twenty, thirty etc., is "-tig" in Dutch:
20 twintig
Starting at twenty one things get a little funny, Dutch puts the single unit before the ten-unit:
21 eenentwintig (literally: one-and-twenty) 22 tweeëntwintig
23 drieëntwintig
24 vierentwintig
25 vijfentwintig
26 zesentwintig
27 zevenentwintig
28 achtentwintig
29 negenentwintig
Notice that one way to deal with two subsequent vowels in Dutch spelling is the diaeresis ë.
The same system goes for 30, 40, 50....
30 dertig
32 tweeëndertig 40 veertig
50 vijftig 60 zestig 70 zeventig 80 tachtig (!!)
90 negentig
The only irregular one is tachtig. Notice that 60 and 70 are pronounced with initial [s].

### Large numbers

100 honderd
Dutch does not use one as 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
143.500 honderddrieënveertigduizend vijfhonderd
1.000.000 één miljoen
2.000.000 twee miljoen
453.897.245 vierhonderddrieënvijftig miljoen achthonderdzevenennegentigduizend tweehonderdvijfenveertig
For higher power of one thousand Dutch follows the British rather than the American system
1.000.000.000 één miljard (not: biljoen, see below)
1.000.000.000.000 één biljoen 1.000.000.000.000.000 één biljard
245.078.476.453.879 tweehonderdvijfenveertig biljoen achtenzeventig miljard vierhonderdzesenzeventig miljoen vierhonderddrieënvijftigduizend achthonderdnegenenzeventig
Notice also that the interpunction is the reverse:
English: $1,324,432.93 = Dutch: $1.324.432,93
Dutch has a decimal comma, not a decimal point.
Translate into Dutch:
* 23
* 55
* 88
* 811
* 1776
* 1945
* 2007
* 23 - drieëntwintig
* 55 - vijfenvijftig
* 88 - achtentachtig
* 811 - achthonderdenelf
* 1776 - zeventienhonderdzesenzeventig - het jaar zeventienzesenzeventig
* 1945 - negentienvijfenveertig
* 2007 - tweeduizendenzeven - het jaar tweeduizend zeven

## 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.
* Weak verbs add either -te(n) or -de(n) to the stem of the verb.
* Strong verbs change the vowel of the stem.
* Irregular verbs often have a combination of the two or show other idiosyncrasies.
The numbers:
* The vast majority (thousands) of Dutch verbs are regular weak verbs.
* There are some 150 strong roots. Including derived verbs, there are some 1500 strong verbs in total.
* There are only about six irregular roots and about two dozen derivatives.
However, the strong and irregular verbs are amongst the most frequently used ones. The more specialized and recently formed ones are typically weak.

### Weak verbs

We have seen how the present tense is formed:
* leren - to learn
* ik leer - I learn → stem is leer

#### Past tense

       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
Notice the similarity with English: the past is formed with a dental suffix: -de (Dutch) -ed (English).
However if the root ends in a voiceless consonant (t, k, f, s, ch, p and x) the endings are voiceless in Dutch -te, -ten:
    passen - to pass
    ik pas - I pass → stem is pas
    ik paste - I passed
    wij pasten - we passed
This happens in about a third of the weak verbs.
Put the following weak verbs in the past tense:
* reizen: ik reis - to travel
* passen: wij passen - to pass, to fit
* betalen: betaal je? - to pay
* maken: u maakt - to make
* doden: hij doodt - to kill
* leven: jullie leven - to live
* voeden: ik voed - to feed
* dansen: danst zij? - to dance
* stofzuigen: ik stofzuig - to vacuum
* verteren: het verteert - to digest, to disintegrate
* ontzeggen: ontzeggen wij? - to deny
* zakken: u zakt: to descend, to fail
* werken: werkt Jan? - to work
* vergaderen: vergaderen zij? - to gather, to be in a meeting
* reizen: ik reis - ik reisde
* passen: wij passen - wij pasten
* betalen: betaal je? - betaalde je?
* maken: u maakt - u maakte
* doden: hij doodt - hij doodde
* leven: jullie leven - jullie leefden
* voeden: ik voed - ik voedde
* dansen: danst zij? - danste zij?
* stofzuigen: ik stofzuig - ik stofzuigde
* verteren: het verteert - het verteerde
* ontzeggen: ontzeggen wij? - ontzegden wij?
* zakken: u zakt: u zakte
* werken: werkt Jan? - werkte Jan
* vergaderen: vergaderen zij? - vergaderden zij?
Notice that the root of reizen is reiz-, resulting in a -de ending even though the stem is written (and pronounced) as reis. The -de ending is added to the stem (not the root). This idiosyncrasy of Dutch orthography gives many school children great headaches.

#### Perfect tense

The perfect uses an auxiliary + the past participle. For a weak verb is formed by prefixing ge- and suffixing an ending -d, or -t.

#### Inseperable verbs

If the verb already has a prefix like be-, ont- or ver- or ge- itself, 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?
These verbs are called inseparable verbs to distinguish them from a group of verbs that have a prefix that can be separated. We will revisit those in a later lesson. The inseparable ones are relatively simple. Apart from the suppression of the ge- prefix they behave like normal verbs.

#### The past participle on -d and -t

The suffix of the participle is -d in the case of leren:
the perfect
    ik heb geleerd - I have learned
This is by far the most common way to form the past participle. However, if the root ends in a voiceless consonant (t, k, f, s, ch, p and x) the ending is a voiceless -t:
    passen - to pass, to fit
    ik pas - I pass → stem is pas
    ik heb gepast - I have passed
Dutch has "final obstruent devoicing", a fancy term for the fact that a consonant at the end of a word is always pronounced as voiceless. That means that both the -d of "geleerd" and the -t of "gepast" as actually pronounced the same, as [t].
However, as in English the participle can also be used as an adjective. As such it also has an inflected form with -e:
    De geleerde les - the lesson learned
    Gepaste eerbied - fitting reverence
In this case the /d/ of geleerde is actually also pronounced [d] and the /t/ of gepaste as [t].
If the root already ends in -d or -t the ending is omitted:
    feesten - gefeest
    baden - gebaad

##### Word order

In contrast to English the participle is put at the end of the sentence:
    Ik heb dat op school geleerd.

##### Primitive tenses

Most Dutch verbs can be fully reconstructed in all their forms if you know three primitive tenses, de stamtijden:
infinitive - past tense singular - perfect participle
    leren - leerde - geleerd
    passen - paste - gepast
    bedoelen - bedoelde - bedoeld
    gebeuren - gebeurde - gebeurd
This is why verbs are often represented this way in dictionaries, including in WikiWoordenboek. If you want a complete table of all possible forms, this becomes rather large especially if you list all the compound tenses.
Take a look at the page toekennen and compare it with the full conjugation at toekennen/vervoeging.

##### Auxiliaries

The auxiliary is usually a form of hebben like it is to have in English (see below for its forms). However, unlike English there is a group of verbs (ergative verbs) that take zijn (to be) instead.
Notice that gebeuren (to happen) is one such case: It is an ergative verb. Instead of an action such verbs express either a process or a movement. Compare:
| type | Dutch | Dutch | English | English |
| process | zijn | de sneeuwballen zijn gesmolten | have | the snowballs have melted |
| movement | zijn | ze zijn gegaan | have | they have gone |
| action | hebben | ze hebben dat gedaan | have | they have done that |
Put the following weak verbs in the perfect tense:
* reizen: ik reis - to travel
* passen: wij passen - to pass, to fit
* betalen: betaal je? - to pay
* maken: u maakt - to make
* doden: hij doodt - to kill
* leven: jullie leven - to live
* voeden: ik voed - to feed
* dansen: danst zij? - to dance
* stofzuigen: ik stofzuig - to vacuum
* verteren: het verteert - to digest, to disintegrate
* ontzeggen: ontzeggen wij? - to deny
* zakken: u zakt: to descend, to fail
* werken: werkt Jan? - to work
* vergaderen: vergaderen zij? - to gather, to be in a meeting
* reizen: ik reis - ik heb/ben gereisd (with a destination: ben, otherwise: heb)
* passen: wij passen - wij hebben gepast
* betalen: betaal je? - heb je betaald?
* maken: u maakt - u heeft gemaakt
* doden: hij doodt - hij heeft gedood
* leven: jullie leven - jullie hebben geleefd
* voeden: ik voed - ik heb gevoed
* dansen: danst zij? - heeft zij gedanst?
* stofzuigen: ik stofzuig - ik heb gestofzuigd
* verteren: het verteert - het is verteerd (process)
* ontzeggen: ontzeggen wij? - hebben we ontzegd?
* zakken: u zakt: u bent gezakt (movement/process)
* werken: werkt Jan? - heeft Jan gewerkt?
* vergaderen: vergaderen zij? - hebben zij vergaderd?
Notice that the root of reizen is reiz-, resulting in a -d ending even though the stem is written (and pronounced) as reis. The -d ending is added to the stem (not the root). This idiosyncrasy of Dutch orthography gives many school children great headaches even more so because the final -d is pronounced devoiced as [t]. In "gereisde" however the [d] does return in the spoken language.

### Strong verbs

| noicon lopen | noicon liep | noicon gelopen |
    lopen - to walk (cf. 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.

#### Which verbs are strong?

There are more than 150 strong roots and including all derived forms lopen, belopen, verlopen etc. there are more than 1500 strong verbs in Dutch. And you will just have to learn them. Few rules can be given which verbs are weak and which are strong, but we can try:
* All verbs borrowed from Latin or French are weak.
* All strong verbs have the basic structure root-ending, e.g. lopen, or (prefix)-root-ending, e.g. beginnen. Verbs with more syllables, like kantelen, begoochelen are always weak.
* Many strong verbs have cognates that are irregular verbs in English. E.g. zingen - zong - gezongen has to sing - sang - sung as cognate. The cognate sometimes has a different meaning, e.g. rijden is cognate with to ride but can mean to drive a car. If you know any German: most strong verbs in Dutch are strong in German as well.

#### The seven classes

There are seven distinct patterns (classes) of vowel change. These patterns are exceedingly old. They come from the Indo-European language and are much better preserved in Dutch than they are in English.
The most common one (Class I) has ..ij... - ..ee.. - ..e..:
| noicon schrijven | noicon schreef | noicon geschreven |
| noicon blijven | noicon bleef | noicon gebleven |
| noicon lijden | noicon leed | noicon geleden |
    schrijven - schreef - geschreven
    blijven - bleef - gebleven
    lijden - leed - geleden
English has far fewer strong verbs left and they have become irregular, i.e. the patterns are no longer very recognizable, although sometimes the resemblance is still striking, compare:
    spreken - to speak
    sprak - spoke
    gesproken - spoken
| noicon spreken | noicon sprak noicon spraken | noicon gesproken |
We will come back to strong verbs later, particularly in the practice lessons 6A and 7A. 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)
If you are uncertain about the primitive tenses of a verb, a trip to WikiWoordenboek will easily remedy that. The primitive tenses are typically given in a small table on the right of the screen. Have a look at lopen.
Lopen is a verb of movement. This is why it uses to be as auxiliary if a direction of the movement process is specified. Compare:
    Ik ben naar huis gelopen - I walked home
    Ik heb altijd veel gelopen - I always did a lot of walking
In the latter case the verb takes "hebben" because the emphasis is not on the movement process but on the activity (action).
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:
| noicon breken | noicon brak noicon braken | noicon gebroken |
    breken-brak-gebroken
    ik brak (as in father)
    wij braken (as in Gaad)
(Thus the verb has four stages of vowel change. This is also a very ancient aspect of the language. It stems straight out of Indo-European. Anglo-Saxon had something similar.)

#### 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)

### 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

#### The auxiliary to have

| noicon hebben | noicon heb | noicon hebt | noicon heeft | noicon hebben | noicon had | noicon gehad |
The most important irregular verbs are hebben and 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

##### Past tense

    ik, jij, hij had - I, you, he had
    wij, jullie, zij hadden - we, you, they had

##### Perfect

    ik heb gehad

#### The auxiliary to be

| noicon zijn | noicon ben | noicon bent | noicon is | noicon was | noicon waren | noicon geweest |
    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 all, they are

##### Past tense

    ik was
    wij waren

##### Perfect

    ik ben geweest - I have been
Notice that to be is seen as an ergative: it is not an action, but a 'process'.

##### Infinitive

| noicon wezen | noicon wees | noicon weest | noicon zij | noicon ware |
    zijn
    wezen
Wezen is quite common in certain parts of the Netherlands, but frowned upon in other regions.

##### Imperative

    wees!
    weest!
    weest u!

##### Subjunctive

    het zij
    past: het ware
Both are archaic but they are still be seen in certain expressions.

### Strong and weak verbs with irregularities

Some strong and weak verbs do not completely follow any of the regular patterns. We have seen one:
| noicon verslaan | noicon versloeg | noicon verslagen |
    verslaan
    ik versla
    ik versloeg
    ik heb verslagen
Notice that the present tense and the infinitive do not have a "g".
There is also a group of weak verbs ends in -cht rather than just -t:
| noicon brengen | noicon bracht | noicon gebracht |
| noicon denken | noicon dacht | noicon gedacht |
    brengen - bracht - gebracht
    denken - dacht - gedacht
The vowel of these roots also changes, but historically these verbs are weak. Notice that English has something similar (brought, thought).
In these cases it is still enough to know the three primitive tenses to reconstruct the entire verb. 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 and reserve the term irregular for the handful cases where this does not suffice.

## Woordenschat 6

| Dutch word | audio file | English translation |
| de school | school (help·info) | school |
| het jaar | jaar (help·info) | year |
| jarig zijn | jarig (help·info) | having a birthday |
| de slag | slag (help·info) | blow, battle |
| de natuur | natuur (help·info) | nature |
| de jongen | jongen (help·info) | boy |
| natuurlijk | natuurlijk (help·info) | naturally, of course |
| schrijven-schreef-geschreven s | schrijven (help·info) | to write |
| lezen-las-gelezen s | lezen (help·info) | to read |
| leren-leerde-geleerd w | leren (help·info) | to learn, to teach |
| bedoelen-bedoelde-bedoeld w | bedoelen (help·info) | to mean, to aim at |
| lopen-liep-gelopen s | lopen (help·info) | to walk |
| bestaan-bestond-bestaan s | bestaan (help·info) | to exist |
| zijn-was-geweest irr | zijn (help·info) | to be |
| hebben-had-gehad irr | hebben (help·info) | to have |
| weten-wist-geweten irr | weten (help·info) | to know |
| zien-zag-gezien s | zien (help·info) | to see |
| zwemmen-zwom-gezwommen s | zwemmen (help·info) | to swim |
| vinden-vond-gevonden s | vinden (help·info) | to find |
| eten-at-gegeten s | eten (help·info) | to eat |
| zitten-zat-gezeten s | zitten (help·info) | to sit |
| denken-dacht-gedacht s | denken (help·info) | to think |
| slapen-sliep-geslapen s | slapen (help·info) | to sleep |

## Quizlet

The vocabulary for this lesson can be studied at Quizlet (60 terms)

## Progress made

If you studied this lesson well you should
* be able to do all cardinal numbers in Dutch
* know how past tenses are formed in Dutch (but you need to memorize a lot more about them)
Cumulative count:
    Cycle 1: 579 terms
    Lesson 5: 87 terms
    Lesson 6: 60 terms

### Grand total

    726 terms.
Also see Dutch/Vocabulary/The numbers for a synopsis and the hover test based on it.
    The necessary work on past tenses will start in Dutch/Lesson 6A