{"id":12845,"date":"2021-04-08T18:21:06","date_gmt":"2021-04-08T18:21:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/?p=12845"},"modified":"2021-04-14T05:58:05","modified_gmt":"2021-04-14T05:58:05","slug":"the-german-genitiv-case-ending-explained-s-es-genitive","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/the-german-genitiv-case-ending-explained-s-es-genitive\/","title":{"rendered":"The German Genitive Case Ending Explained"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>For all the German learners out there, I probably don&#8217;t need to say this. Grammar in German is a pain. In the jungle of articles, conjugations and cases, it can be daunting to get it all right.\u00a0We&#8217;ve <a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/?s=genitiv&amp;submit=Submit+Search\">written about the\u00a0<em>Genitiv<\/em> (Genitive) jungle before<\/a>. And today, I want to focus on a small patch in that jungle. It&#8217;s an issue even native Germans struggle with: The use of the ending <em>-(e)s.<\/em> But don&#8217;t worry, it&#8217;s doable! Let me show you.<\/p>\n<h1>What&#8217;s the Genitive case again?<\/h1>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Alternativen zum Genitiv\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/PrwVjKCmtu0?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>The\u00a0<em>Genitiv<\/em> (genitive) is the possessive case in German. For example, in the sentence <em>die Tasche <strong>der Frau <\/strong><\/em>(the bag <strong>of the woman<\/strong>), &#8220;<em>der Frau<\/em>&#8221; is in the <i>Genitiv <\/i>case. So instead of using &#8220;of&#8221; to indicate possession like in English, Germans like to keep it short and just change the article to indicate possession. Old English <a href=\"https:\/\/oldenglishteaching.arts.gla.ac.uk\/Units\/3_Description_of_OE.html\">did this too<\/a>, but modern English got rid of the <em>Genitiv <\/em>case completely.<sup class=\"modern-footnotes-footnote \" data-mfn=\"1\" data-mfn-post-scope=\"0000000000002ec30000000000000000_12845\"><a href=\"javascript:void(0)\"  role=\"button\" aria-pressed=\"false\" aria-describedby=\"mfn-content-0000000000002ec30000000000000000_12845-1\">1<\/a><\/sup><span id=\"mfn-content-0000000000002ec30000000000000000_12845-1\" role=\"tooltip\" class=\"modern-footnotes-footnote__note\" tabindex=\"0\" data-mfn=\"1\">Old English, in fact, had four cases itself!<\/span> The only remnant that&#8217;s left is the <em>&#8216;s<\/em> to indicate possession:\u00a0<strong>The woman&#8217;s <\/strong>bag. This alternative way of expressing the\u00a0<em>Genitive\u00a0<\/em>does not exist in German.<sup class=\"modern-footnotes-footnote \" data-mfn=\"2\" data-mfn-post-scope=\"0000000000002ec30000000000000000_12845\"><a href=\"javascript:void(0)\"  role=\"button\" aria-pressed=\"false\" aria-describedby=\"mfn-content-0000000000002ec30000000000000000_12845-2\">2<\/a><\/sup><span id=\"mfn-content-0000000000002ec30000000000000000_12845-2\" role=\"tooltip\" class=\"modern-footnotes-footnote__note\" tabindex=\"0\" data-mfn=\"2\">If you now think: But you can say &#8220;die Frauentasche&#8221;, you aren&#8217;t wrong. But now, you created a new noun that means &#8220;a bag for women&#8221;, which in English would normally translated as &#8220;woman&#8217;s bag&#8221;<\/span><\/p>\n<p>The only other way that you will see quite frequently, actually, is\u00a0<em>von dem\/der\u00a0<\/em>(of the), or the contracted version\u00a0<em>vom<\/em>:<\/p>\n<p><em>Die Tasche <strong>von der<\/strong> Frau\u00a0<\/em>(the bag of the woman)<\/p>\n<p><em>Die Tasche <strong>von dem<\/strong> Mann\u00a0<\/em>(the bag of the man).<\/p>\n<p><em>Die Tasche <strong>von dem<\/strong> Kind\u00a0<\/em>(the bag of the child).<\/p>\n<p>The preposition <em>von\u00a0<\/em>goes with the <em>Dativ <\/em>case, so that&#8217;s why we suddenly see a\u00a0<strong><em>dem<\/em><\/strong>. It can also mean &#8220;from&#8221;, but <a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/prepositions-that-require-the-dative-case\/\">that&#8217;s another story.<\/a> In general, if you want to know about prepositions and how to use them, <a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/german-prepositions-all-you-need-to-know\/\">I wrote an All-You-Need-To-Know article about them<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>So in that way, German is easier! Nice and short, with either an\u00a0<em>-s\u00a0<\/em>or an\u00a0<em>-r\u00a0<\/em>ending, like so:<\/p>\n<table style=\"border-collapse: collapse;width: 224px;height: 113px\" border=\"0\" width=\"192\" cellspacing=\"0\" cellpadding=\"0\">\n<tbody>\n<tr style=\"height: 14.4pt\">\n<td style=\"height: 14.4pt;width: 48pt\" width=\"64\" height=\"19\"><em>Genitiv<\/em><\/td>\n<td style=\"width: 48pt\" width=\"64\">singular<\/td>\n<td style=\"width: 48pt\" width=\"64\">plural<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr style=\"height: 14.4pt\">\n<td style=\"height: 14.4pt\" height=\"19\">masculine<\/td>\n<td>de<strong>s<\/strong><\/td>\n<td>de<strong>r<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr style=\"height: 14.4pt\">\n<td style=\"height: 14.4pt\" height=\"19\">feminine<\/td>\n<td>de<strong>r<\/strong><\/td>\n<td>de<strong>r<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr style=\"height: 14.4pt\">\n<td style=\"height: 14.4pt\" height=\"19\">neuter<\/td>\n<td>de<strong>s<\/strong><\/td>\n<td>de<strong>r<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<p>Some different stuff happens where you want to add adjectives, but we <a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/the-genitive-case-possessive-adjectives\/\">discussed this elsewhere<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>What I want to focus on is the\u00a0<em>-s\u00a0<\/em>that you get at the end of a\u00a0the\u00a0<em>Genitiv<\/em>. Let me show you.<\/p>\n<h1><strong>The Ending of the Genitive<em>: <\/em>-es and -s<\/strong><\/h1>\n<div id=\"attachment_12847\" style=\"width: 1034px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone post-item__attachment\"><a href=\"https:\/\/unsplash.com\/photos\/2QUvkQTBh5s\" aria-label=\"Johannes Plenio 2QUvkQTBh5s Unsplash 1024x571\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-12847\" class=\"wp-image-12847 size-large\"  alt=\"Genitive Storm Ending German Genitiv\" width=\"1024\" height=\"571\" \/ src=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2021\/04\/johannes-plenio-2QUvkQTBh5s-unsplash-1024x571.jpg\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2021\/04\/johannes-plenio-2QUvkQTBh5s-unsplash-1024x571.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2021\/04\/johannes-plenio-2QUvkQTBh5s-unsplash-350x195.jpg 350w, https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2021\/04\/johannes-plenio-2QUvkQTBh5s-unsplash-768x429.jpg 768w, https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2021\/04\/johannes-plenio-2QUvkQTBh5s-unsplash-1536x857.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2021\/04\/johannes-plenio-2QUvkQTBh5s-unsplash-2048x1143.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-12847\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Photo by <a href=\"https:\/\/unsplash.com\/@jplenio?utm_source=unsplash&amp;utm_medium=referral&amp;utm_content=creditCopyText\">Johannes Plenio<\/a> on <a href=\"https:\/\/unsplash.com\/s\/photos\/storm?utm_source=unsplash&amp;utm_medium=referral&amp;utm_content=creditCopyText\">Unsplash<\/a><\/p><\/div>\n<p>The\u00a0<em>Genitiv\u00a0<\/em>does not only change the article and adjectives, it also changes the end of the\u00a0<em>Genitiv\u00a0<\/em>itself. The\u00a0<em>Genitiv\u00a0<\/em>gains an\u00a0<em>-es\u00a0<\/em>or <em>-s<\/em> at the end.<\/p>\n<p>However, this is the case <strong>only for masculine and neuter nouns<\/strong>. So for feminine nouns: it stays with\u00a0<em>die Tasche der Frau\u00a0<\/em>(the bag of the woman), not\u00a0<em>die Tasche der Frau<strong>s<\/strong>.<\/em> Here&#8217;s if that bag suddenly changes possession to a man or child<sup class=\"modern-footnotes-footnote \" data-mfn=\"3\" data-mfn-post-scope=\"0000000000002ec30000000000000000_12845\"><a href=\"javascript:void(0)\"  role=\"button\" aria-pressed=\"false\" aria-describedby=\"mfn-content-0000000000002ec30000000000000000_12845-3\">3<\/a><\/sup><span id=\"mfn-content-0000000000002ec30000000000000000_12845-3\" role=\"tooltip\" class=\"modern-footnotes-footnote__note\" tabindex=\"0\" data-mfn=\"3\">children are neuter in German. Don&#8217;t ask me why.<\/span>:<\/p>\n<p><em>Die Tasche des Mann<strong>es<\/strong>\/Mann<strong>s <\/strong><\/em>(the bag of the man)<\/p>\n<p><em>Die Tasche des Kind<strong>es<\/strong>\/Kind<strong>s <\/strong><\/em>(the bag of the child).<\/p>\n<p><em>Die Tasche des Kapit\u00e4n<strong>s<\/strong>\u00a0<\/em>(the bag of the captain).<\/p>\n<p>These ending letters can be called <em>die <\/em><em>Genitivendung\u00a0<\/em>(genitive ending).<\/p>\n<p>Whether you use <strong><em>&#8211;<\/em><\/strong><em>es <\/em>or simply <em>-s <\/em>depends on the ending of the word. If it ends with a vowel, simply add an <em>-s.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>If it ends with <em>-en, -em, -el, -er,<\/em> or it&#8217;s a <em>Verkleinerung\u00a0<\/em>(diminution), you also simply get an\u00a0<em>-s<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>However, often both -es and -s can be used, too! The easiest way to find out what you can use when you&#8217;re in doubt is to <a title=\"4 Tips to Improve Your German Accent as an American\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/4-tips-to-improve-your-german-accent-as-an-american-pronunciation-guide-help-tips-german-pronunciation\/\">say it out loud<\/a> or to check the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.duden.de\/rechtschreibung\/Mann_Person_Gatte_Anrede\">Duden website<\/a>. At the bottom, there is a page with declinations of the word.<\/p>\n<p>The rule is that it is always used. But what about words that end on an\u00a0<em>s<\/em>?<\/p>\n<h2><strong>German words ending on\u00a0<em>s\u00a0<\/em><\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>Examples:\u00a0<strong><em>das Haus<\/em> (house), <em>der Bus<\/em> (bus), <em>das Fass<\/em> (barrel)<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>In these cases, you have a\u00a0<em>Zischlaut\u00a0<\/em>(sibilant) at the end of the word, so adding an\u00a0<em>-s<\/em> wouldn&#8217;t change anything. And that&#8217;s a problem<\/p>\n<p>So you add\u00a0<em>-es\u00a0<\/em>to make pronunciation possible:<\/p>\n<p><em>Der Mann <strong>des<\/strong> Haus<strong>es<\/strong> sitzt auf dem Sitz <strong>des<\/strong> Bus<strong>ses<\/strong> mit dem Deckel <strong>des<\/strong> Fass<strong>es<\/strong>\u00a0<\/em>(The man of the house is sitting on the seat of the bus with the lid of the barrel).<\/p>\n<p>Bus is a weird one &#8211; but that&#8217;s more because the\u00a0<em>u\u00a0<\/em>would become a long\u00a0<em>u\u00a0<\/em>if\u00a0<em>Busses\u00a0<\/em>was written with one\u00a0<em>s<\/em>: <em>Buses. <\/em>Had the word been a proper German word, it should have a double\u00a0<em>ss\u00a0<\/em>or\u00a0<em>\u00df\u00a0<\/em>ending, like\u00a0<em>das Fass<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>Pretty simple so far.<\/p>\n<h2><strong>No ending?<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>Examples:\u00a0<strong><em>der Fokus\u00a0<\/em>(focus),\u00a0<em>der Kapitalismus\u00a0<\/em>(capitalism),\u00a0<em>das Leasing\u00a0<\/em>(leasing),\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/the-curiosity-of-the-german-word-shitstorm\/\"><em>der Shitstorm<\/em> (the &#8220;flak&#8221;)<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Words with Latin endings have the same problem &#8211;\u00a0<em>des Kapitalismusses? des Fokusses?\u00a0<\/em>How on earth do you do that right?<\/p>\n<p><em>Der Kern <strong>des<\/strong> Fokus ist das Ziel <strong>des<\/strong> Kapitalismus <\/em>(The core of the focus is the goal of capitalism).<\/p>\n<p>Well, German just decided to keep those words the same! So no matter what, words ending on\u00a0<em>-us\u00a0<\/em>and\u00a0<em>-mus\u00a0<\/em>stay the same.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>What about foreign words? Do they get the <em>-s<\/em> or <em>-es<\/em>?<\/p>\n<p>Yes and no. If the word is common in German, you simply treat it like a German word, so you add the <em>-s<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p><em>Der Effekt <strong>des<\/strong> Shitstorm<strong>s<\/strong> war eine Beschwerde <\/em>(the effect of the flak was a complaint).<\/p>\n<p>But foreign words that aren&#8217;t that common:<\/p>\n<p><em>Die Funktion <strong>des<\/strong> Keyboard ist immer gleich\u00a0<\/em>(The function of the keyboard is always the same).<\/p>\n<p>You could write these with the -es\/-s ending, too. It&#8217;s kind of up to you.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>This perfectly leads into\u00a0<strong><em>Eigennamen <\/em>(m, proper names)<\/strong>. These never get the <em>Genitivendung <\/em><em>-s <\/em>or <em>-es<\/em>. So:<\/p>\n<p><em>Das Ziel <strong>des<\/strong> Jan ist unklar <\/em>(The goal of Jan is unclear).<\/p>\n<p>However, in these cases, the preposition\u00a0<strong><em>von<\/em><\/strong>, as explained earlier, makes more sense: <em>Das Ziel <strong>von<\/strong> Jan <\/em><em>ist unklar<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>In the case of\u00a0<em>Eigennamen<\/em>, that don&#8217;t really work with articles, you can also use the <strong><em>&#8216;s<\/em><\/strong>, like in English:<\/p>\n<p><em>Jan<strong>&#8216;s<\/strong> Ziel ist unklar <\/em>&#8211; Jan&#8217;s goal is unclear.<\/p>\n<p><em>Die Musik <strong>des<\/strong> Bach ist bis heute relevant<\/em> (The music of Bach is relevant to this day).<\/p>\n<p>Again, you can rewrite this as\u00a0<em>Bach&#8217;s Musik\u00a0<\/em>or\u00a0<em>die Musik von Bach<\/em>, which are both a lot more common these days than\u00a0<em>des Bach<\/em>.<\/p>\n<h2>What&#8217;s the\u00a0<em>-n\/-en<\/em>?<\/h2>\n<p>There are some words that get an\u00a0<em>-n <\/em>ending in the <em>Genitiv<\/em>. This happens when the stress of the word is on the last syllable. So:<\/p>\n<p><em>Die Kamera <strong>des <\/strong>Fotograf<strong>en<\/strong> war klein. Trotzdem konnte er damit ein gutes Bild <strong>des<\/strong> Student<strong>en<\/strong> machen. <\/em>(The camera of the photographer was small. Yet he could take a good picture of the student with it).<\/p>\n<p>So this rather uncommon ending looks like <a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/the-genitive-case-possessive-adjectives\/\">the ending possessive adjectives get<\/a>. That makes things a bit easier.<\/p>\n<h4><strong>How do you feel about the -s\/-es of the German\u00a0<em>Genitiv<\/em>? Helpful to understand the case better? Confusing? Annoying? I&#8217;d love to know! Please tell me in the comments below.<\/strong><\/h4>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<ul class=\"modern-footnotes-list modern-footnotes-list--show-only-for-print\"><li><span>1<\/span><div>Old English, in fact, had four cases itself!<\/div><\/li><li><span>2<\/span><div>If you now think: But you can say &#8220;die Frauentasche&#8221;, you aren&#8217;t wrong. But now, you created a new noun that means &#8220;a bag for women&#8221;, which in English would normally translated as &#8220;woman&#8217;s bag&#8221;<\/div><\/li><li><span>3<\/span><div>children are neuter in German. Don&#8217;t ask me why.<\/div><\/li><\/ul>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<img width=\"350\" height=\"195\" src=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2021\/04\/johannes-plenio-2QUvkQTBh5s-unsplash-350x195.jpg\" class=\"attachment-post-thumbnail size-post-thumbnail wp-post-image\" alt=\"\" decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2021\/04\/johannes-plenio-2QUvkQTBh5s-unsplash-350x195.jpg 350w, https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2021\/04\/johannes-plenio-2QUvkQTBh5s-unsplash-1024x571.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2021\/04\/johannes-plenio-2QUvkQTBh5s-unsplash-768x429.jpg 768w, https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2021\/04\/johannes-plenio-2QUvkQTBh5s-unsplash-1536x857.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2021\/04\/johannes-plenio-2QUvkQTBh5s-unsplash-2048x1143.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 350px) 100vw, 350px\" \/><p>For all the German learners out there, I probably don&#8217;t need to say this. Grammar in German is a pain. In the jungle of articles, conjugations and cases, it can be daunting to get it all right.\u00a0We&#8217;ve written about the\u00a0Genitiv (Genitive) jungle before. And today, I want to focus on a small patch in that&hellip;<\/p>\n<p class=\"post-item__readmore\"><a class=\"btn btn--md\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/the-german-genitiv-case-ending-explained-s-es-genitive\/\">Continue Reading<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":110,"featured_media":12847,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":""},"categories":[11971,8],"tags":[95362,1083,1084],"class_list":["post-12845","post","type-post","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-grammar-language","category-language","tag-case-grammar","tag-genitive","tag-genitive-case"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12845","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/110"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12845"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12845\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12856,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12845\/revisions\/12856"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12847"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12845"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12845"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/german\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12845"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}