de of het voorgevoel?
het voorgevoel
presentiment
noun
It is “het voorgevoel”. The plural is “de voorgevoelens”, and like every Dutch plural it takes “de”.
Pronunciation, example sentences and the rest of the entry: voorgevoel
Forms
- Article
- het voorgevoel
- Plural
- de voorgevoelens
- Diminutive
- het voorgevoeltje
- Also means
- premonition
- How common
- among the 10,000 most common Dutch words
In a sentence
Hij had een vreemd voorgevoel dat er iets mis was.
He had a strange presentiment that something was wrong.
Haar voorgevoelens hebben haar vaak gewaarschuwd voor gevaar.
Her premonitions have often warned her of danger.
Ik heb een raar voorgevoel.
I have a strange presentiment.
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 voorgevoel” rather than as “voorgevoel” 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.