de of het kerstcadeau?
het kerstcadeau
Christmas present
noun
It is “het kerstcadeau”. The plural is “de kerstcadeaus”, and like every Dutch plural it takes “de”.
Pronunciation, example sentences and the rest of the entry: kerstcadeau
Forms
- Article
- het kerstcadeau
- Plural
- de kerstcadeaus
- Diminutive
- het kerstcadeautje
- How common
- in everyday Dutch
In a sentence
Het kerstcadeau ligt onder de boom.
The Christmas present is under the tree.
Ik heb een mooi kerstcadeau gekocht.
I bought a nice Christmas present.
Wat wil jij als kerstcadeau?
What do you want as a Christmas present?
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 kerstcadeau” rather than as “kerstcadeau” 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.