de of het ondergoed?
het ondergoed
underwear
noun · /ˈɔndərˌɣut/
It is “het ondergoed”.
Pronunciation, example sentences and the rest of the entry: ondergoed
Forms
- Article
- het ondergoed
- Diminutive
- het ondergoedje
- How common
- among the 5,000 most common Dutch words
In a sentence
Ik moet nieuw ondergoed kopen.
I need to buy new underwear.
Waar is mijn schone ondergoed gebleven?
Where has my clean underwear gone?
Leg al je ondergoed in de wasmand.
Put all your underwear in the laundry basket.
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 ondergoed” rather than as “ondergoed” 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.