de of het roet?
het roet
soot
noun · /rut/
It is “het roet”.
Pronunciation, example sentences and the rest of the entry: roet
Forms
- Article
- het roet
- Also means
- fungus type
- How common
- in everyday Dutch
In a sentence
De schoorsteen zit vol roet.
The chimney is full of soot.
Ik moet het roet van de muur vegen.
I need to wipe the soot off the wall.
Het ruikt hier naar roet.
It smells like soot here.
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 roet” rather than as “roet” 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.