de of het vriespunt?
het vriespunt
freezing point
noun
It is “het vriespunt”. The plural is “de vriespunten”, and like every Dutch plural it takes “de”.
Pronunciation, example sentences and the rest of the entry: vriespunt
Forms
- Article
- het vriespunt
- Plural
- de vriespunten
- Diminutive
- het vriespuntje
- How common
- in everyday Dutch
In a sentence
De temperatuur daalt snel naar het vriespunt.
The temperature is quickly dropping to freezing point.
Het zal vannacht onder het vriespunt komen.
It will drop below freezing point tonight.
Gelukkig blijft de temperatuur boven het vriespunt.
Luckily, the temperature stays above freezing point.
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 vriespunt” rather than as “vriespunt” 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.