de of het letsel?
het letsel
injury
noun · /ˈlɛt.səl/
It is “het letsel”. The plural is “de letsels”, and like every Dutch plural it takes “de”.
Pronunciation, example sentences and the rest of the entry: letsel
Forms
- Article
- het letsel
- Plural
- de letsels
- Diminutive
- het letseltje
- Also means
- lesion
- How common
- among the 10,000 most common Dutch words
In a sentence
Het letsel viel gelukkig mee.
The injury was fortunately not too bad.
Hij heeft ernstig letsel opgelopen bij het ongeval.
He sustained serious injuries in the accident.
Is het letsel al volledig genezen?
Has the injury fully healed 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 letsel” rather than as “letsel” 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.