When you get in contact with strangers you would certainly like to find out more about them. Among other things, you would probably like know where a person does come from. In order to ask someone in German where a person is from you need to know the German verb “kommen” (to come). In order to conjugate “kommen” all you have to do is lop the ending –en off the stem and attach the correct conjugation ending.
|
Singular
|
Plural
|
| 1st Person |
ich komme |
wir kommen |
|
(I come) |
(we come) |
|
|
|
| 2nd person |
Sie kommen (formal) |
Sie kommen (formal) |
|
(you come) |
(you come) |
|
|
|
|
du kommst (informal) |
ihr kommt (informal) |
|
(you come) |
(you come) |
|
|
|
| 3rd person |
er / sie / es kommt |
sie kommen |
|
(he / she / it comes) |
(they come) |
Here are possible question how you can ask where someone is from.
| A: |
Woher kommen Sie? (Where do you come from?) – formal, 2nd pers. sgl. and pl. |
| B: |
Ich komme aus … (I come from …) |
| A: |
Woher kommst du? Informal (Where do you come from?) – informal, 2nd pers. sgl. |
| B: |
Ich komme aus … (I come from …) |
| A: |
Woher kommt ihr? (Where do you come from?) – informal, 3rd pers. pl. |
| B: |
Wir kommen aus … (We come from …) |
| A: |
Woher kommt Annika? (Where does Annika come from?) |
| B: |
Sie kommt aus … (She comes from …) |
| A: |
Woher kommt Thorsten? (Where does Thorsten come from?) |
| B: |
Er kommt aus … (He comes from …) |
Keep in mind that most countries, towns, and cities are neuter in German. Therefore, they take the article das. But all countries, towns, and cities which take das are never used with the articles. That is, you do not say “Ich komme aus dem Deutschland” but simply “Ich komme aus Deutschland.” An article is only used when a country, town, or city is either feminine or masculine in the nominative case. Here is a list of some examples.
die USA – the USA (Ich komme aus den USA.)
die Vereinigten Staaten von Amerika – the United States of America (Ich komme aus den Vereinigten Staaten von Amerika.)
der Irak – Iraq (Ich komme aus dem Irak.)
der Iran – Iran (Ich komme aus dem Iran.)
der Jemen – Yemen (Ich komme aus dem Jemen.)
der Libanon – Lebanon (Ich komme aus dem Lebanon.)
der Kongo – Congo (Ich komme aus dem Kongo.)
die Schweiz – Switzerland (Ich komme aus der Schweiz.)
Comments:
ronin:
Why do we use “dem” before the aforementioned countries?
thanks
mai:
Because aus wants Dativ, der in Dativ bekomes dem
Efrutik:
Oh I see, so then you have used “dem” only because “An article is only used when a country, town, or city is either feminine or masculine in the nominative case”. Aha, but I belive my instructor for German did not require us to utilize dem when stating “Ich komme aus USA”. Is that a mistake if one does not use “dem” article? Please advise, thanks!
Sandra Rösner:
@Efrutik Yes, all countries, cities, and towns that are feminine or masculine in German HAVE TO be used with an article. If a noun is masculine it gets the article DEM and if a noun is feminine it gets the article DEN.
das Amerika (nominative) => “Ich komme aus Amerika.”
die USA => “Ich komme aus DEN USA.”
die Vereinigten Staaten von Amerika => “Ich komme aus DEN Vereinigten Staaten von Amerika.”
So, yes your sentence is incomplete when you omit DEN in combination with “USA”.
The genders of counties have nothing to do with geography (African and ‘Arabic’ countries). You have to use the article DEM with them because they are masculine in German, that’s all.
efrutik:
Sandra, thank you for your explanation!
Anon:
Sandra is not quite correct. The countries that are considered PLURAL change to “den.” Just feminine countries change to “der.” die Schweiz – Switzerland (Ich komme aus der Schweiz.) That’s why you use “der” here and not “den”, because Schweiz is feminine, but not plural. Whereas die USA or die vereinigten Staaten are both plural and thus become “den” in the dative case.
Anon:
Sandra, you’re not correct that feminine nouns become “den” in the dative. PLURAL nouns become “den” in the dative, feminine nouns become “der.” So, “Ich komme aus den USA.” USA is considered plural in German, which is why one also says, “Ich komme aus DEN vereinigten Staaten.”
Bojan:
If i would like to say “I am komming from Iran to Germany”, then i would use akkusativ with aus and maybe something other like von?