Being able to understand grammar terminology is crucial, but many people learning German find it challenging to get to grips with it. Here are the most important terms, explained in simple language, that you may want to know before your first German lessons.

Nouns, pronouns and the parts of a sentence

Noun

A noun is a person, place, thing or idea. In German, all nouns are capitalised: if a word in the middle of a sentence starts with a capital letter, it is a noun or a word acting as a noun (such as a name).

Pronoun

A pronoun replaces a noun and refers back to a noun mentioned earlier: when we are talking about John, we can say he or him instead of using his name again. It does the same job in a sentence as a noun and can be the subject, the direct object, the indirect object or the object in a prepositional phrase.

Relative pronoun

A relative pronoun introduces a relative clause, which tells you more about a noun in the clause before it. In a German relative clause, the conjugated verb moves to the end.

Subject

The subject of a sentence is always a noun or pronoun. It is the person or thing that does the action of the verb.

Verb

The verb is the action word of the sentence and describes what is being done. In German, the conjugated verb takes the second position in a simple sentence or main clause. In clauses introduced by subordinating conjunctions such as dass or weil, it goes to the end of the clause.

Direct object

The direct object is the ‘do-ee’ of the sentence: the person or thing to which something is being done. It, too, is always a noun or pronoun.

Indirect object

The indirect object is a noun or pronoun that answers the question ‘to whom?’ or ‘for whom?’ something is being done: the beneficiary of the verb.

Articles and other small words

Definite article

A definite article (the in English) refers to a specific noun. In German, these are der, die and das and all their case and gender forms: dem, den, des and so on.

Indefinite article

An indefinite article (a or an in English) refers to a noun whose exact identity is not specified: not the bird, not that bird, but a bird. In German, this is ein or eine and its various forms.

Demonstrative article

Dieser (this), jeder (every) and mancher (some) are demonstrative articles in German. They follow the same rules as the definite article.

Possessive article

Possessive articles indicate to whom or what something belongs. For example: Is this your pen? No, this is my pen.

Adjective

An adjective describes a noun or pronoun by answering ‘what kind?’ or ‘which one?’: the fast car, das schnelle Auto.

Adverb

An adverb describes a verb by answering ‘how?’, ‘when?’, ‘where?’ or ‘to what extent?’. In German, adjectives and adverbs look the same in their base form (schön can mean nice or nicely); however, adjectives take endings when they come before a noun, and adverbs never do.

Preposition

A preposition shows the position of one noun or pronoun in relation to another: he is sitting on the sofa. Together with its noun, it forms a prepositional phrase: on the sofa. Prepositions answer the same types of questions as adverbs.

Conjunction

A conjunction joins words or groups of words. Some German conjunctions are und (and), oder (or), aber (but), weil (because) and dass (that).

Verbs

Infinitive

An infinitive is the base form of a verb, without any ending to show person or tense. In German, an infinitive always ends in -en or -n, and it is the form you find in the dictionary: machen, gehen.

Conjugation

Conjugation is the set of endings (and sometimes vowel changes) that mark person and tense: to be becomes I am, you are; sein becomes ich bin, du bist.

Tense

Tenses are forms of the verb that show when something takes place, has taken place or will take place. The present tense (das Präsens) describes something that is happening, facts or eternal truths. The perfect tense (das Perfekt) describes events that are completed or occurred in the past.

Modal verb

A modal verb modifies the main verb to indicate that something may, can, must or is allowed to happen. Modal verbs are conjugated, and the main verb goes to the end of the sentence in the infinitive.

Subjunctive

The subjunctive describes something that is not real: wishful thinking, or something attached to conditions. In layman’s terms, it is sometimes called the conditional. Konjunktiv II in the past is how German says would have, could have and should have.

Gender, case and declension

Gender

The definite article shows the grammatical gender of a noun: der for masculine, die for feminine and das for neuter nouns. Grammatical and biological gender should not be mixed up, although with people the two usually coincide (das Mädchen is the famous exception).

Cases

Cases indicate the function of a noun in a sentence. In German, the subject is in the nominative case, the direct object in the accusative and the indirect object in the dative: Der nette Mann kauft der jungen Frau einen schönen Blumenstrauß.

Declension

Declension is the change of an article, adjective or noun depending on its case. In the example above, die junge Frau becomes der jungen Frau because she is the indirect object.