de of het lied?
het lied
song
noun · /lit/
It is “het lied”. The plural is “de liederen”, and like every Dutch plural it takes “de”.
Pronunciation, example sentences and the rest of the entry: lied
Forms
- Article
- het lied
- Plural
- de liederen
- Diminutive
- het liedje
- How common
- among the 3,000 most common Dutch words
In a sentence
Ik luister graag naar dit lied.
I like listening to this song.
Zing je favoriete lied voor ons.
Sing your favorite song for us.
De liederen klonken vrolijk en luid.
The songs sounded cheerful and loud.
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 lied” rather than as “lied” 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.