de of het knooppunt?
het knooppunt
interchange
noun · /ˈknoːpʏnt/
It is “het knooppunt”. The plural is “de knooppunten”, and like every Dutch plural it takes “de”.
Pronunciation, example sentences and the rest of the entry: knooppunt
Forms
- Article
- het knooppunt
- Plural
- de knooppunten
- Diminutive
- het knooppuntje
- How common
- in everyday Dutch
In a sentence
Volg de borden tot het volgende knooppunt.
Follow the signs until the next interchange.
Dit knooppunt is berucht om zijn files.
This interchange is notorious for its traffic jams.
Ons huis ligt dichtbij een groot knooppunt.
Our house is close to a large interchange.
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 knooppunt” rather than as “knooppunt” 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.