Lesson 9: Genitive
In this lesson you will learn the possessive pronouns and the genitive case.
Possessive Pronouns
In the following table you can find the German possessive pronouns:
Bad news: Like many things in German, possessive pronouns change according to gender, number and case. The following table shows the endings, using mein (my) as an example:
Case
masculine
feminine
neuter
plural
Nominativ (Subject)
mein Hund
meine Katze
mein Schaf
meine Hunde
Akkusativ (Direct object)
meinen Hund
meine Katze
mein Schaf
meine Hunde
Dativ (Indirect object)
meinem Hund
meiner Katze
meinem Schaf
meinen Hunden
Genitiv (Indirect object)
meines Hundes
meiner Hunde
meines Schafes
meiner Hunde
Most possessive pronouns work like that, only euer is a bit irregular:
Case
masculine
feminine
neuter
plural
Nominativ (Subject)
euer Hund
eure Katze
euer Schaf
eure Hunde
Akkusativ (Direct object)
euren Hund
eure Katze
euer Schaf
eure Hunde
Dativ (Indirect object)
eurem Hund
eurer Katze
eurem Schaf
euren Hunden
Genitiv (Indirect object)
eures Hundes
eurer Katze
eures Schafes
eurer Hunde
Like you can see above, as soon as something gets added, the second e disappears.
But what if I want to use the possessive pronouns without the noun, like for example in the English sentence The dog is mine? Like English, German uses slightly different words then - the pronoun stays the same, but the ending changes:
Case
masculine
feminine
neuter
plural
Nominativ (Subject)
meiner
meine
meins
meine
Akkusativ (Direct object)
meinen
meine
meins
meine
Dativ (Indirect object)
meinem
meiner
meinem
meinen
Genitiv (Indirect object)
meines
meiner
meines
meiner
Again, the root of euer changes into eure when something gets added.
Building the Genitive Case
Now you knwo how to say things like your dog, but what if you want to say the dog's toy? Then you'll need the genitive case. For this you need to do to things: First, you need to use the right article - like for subject, direct object and dative, also the genitive has it's own set of articles. Second, you need to add the genitive case ending to some nouns.
First, let's take a look at the new articles:
Gender
definite
indefinite
Not that bad, right? Now you just need to build the genitive form of the noun.
Good news first: Feminine and plural nouns don't change in the genitive! Just use the right article and the root noun/the plural after the thing that belongs to them:
Ich sehe das Buch der Frau.
I see the woman's book.
Das Haus der Familie ist groß.
The family's house is big.
Maskuline and neuter nouns get the ending -(e)s. You add an -es if the noun has only one syllable, or ends with - s, - ss, - ß, - tz, - x or - z, or ends with -nis - in that case you double the s.
Some examples:
Ich sehe das Buch des Mannes.
I see the man's book.
Das Haus des Mädchens ist groß.
The girl's house is big.
Die Katze spielt mit dem Spielzeug des Hundes.
The cat plays with the dog's toy.
Die Farbe des Glases ist schön.
The color of the glass is beautiful.
Proper Nouns
Other than with normal nouns, proper nouns go before the thing they own when building the genitive. Also, they always get the ending -s, except for if the name ends with -s, -tz, -x or -z, in that cases, you just write an ' after the name:
Exercises