de of het glazuur?
het glazuur
glaze
noun
It is “het glazuur”.
Pronunciation, example sentences and the rest of the entry: glazuur
Forms
- Article
- het glazuur
- Also means
- icing, enamel
- How common
- in everyday Dutch
In a sentence
De donut heeft veel glazuur.
The donut has a lot of glaze.
Ik smeer het glazuur op de koekjes.
I spread the glaze on the cookies.
Het glazuur is nog niet hard.
The glaze is not hard yet.
Why this article
No rule predicts it
This one has to be memorised. No spelling pattern marks it as neuter, which is exactly why it is worth learning as “het glazuur” rather than as “glazuur” on its own.
The rules that do work
- • Every plural takes “de”, without exception.
- • Every diminutive ending in -je takes “het”, without exception.
- • Nouns ending in -ing, -heid, -tie, -teit or -schap take “de”.
- • Roughly two thirds of all nouns take “de”, so it is the better guess.
Other nouns whose article has to be memorised
Stop guessing de and het
Woordje has a practice mode for exactly this: it shows a noun and asks for the article, and keeps asking until you stop getting it wrong.