294

The Loom of Language

and in unless the verb denotes motion With the neuter, feminine and
masculine nouns das Haus (house), die Frau (woman), der Hut (hat), we
therefore write
PLURAL
ohne die Hauser      mit den Hausern
ohne meine Hauser  in meinen Hausern
singular
ohne das Haus        mit dem Haus
ohne mein Haus       mit meinem Haus

fur die Frau
fur meine Frau
durch den Hut
durch meinen Hut

von der Frau
von meiner Frau
in dem Hut
in meinem Hut

fur die Frauen *
fur unsere Frauen
durch die Hute
durch meine Hute

von den Frauen
von unseren Frauen
in den Huten
von meinen Huten

The rules for choice of endings appropriate to ordinary adjectives fall
under four headings
(i) If predicative, an adjective has the dictionary form without addition
of any ending It behaves as all English adjectives behave We do not
have to bother about the number, gender or case of the noun We use
the same word dumm to say
Das ist dumm      = this is stupid     Sie ist dumm     = she is stupid
Er ist dumm        = he is stupid       Wir sind dumm = we are stupid
(u) If the adjective comes after a demonstrative or the definite article it
behaves like nouns of the weak class represented by der Knabe (p 290)
We then have to choose between the two endings -E and -EN in accor-
dance witn the number, gender, and case of the noun The ending -E is
the form which always goes with a singular subject It is also the accusa-
tive case-form for singular nouns of the feminine and neuter classes
Otherwise we have to use the ending -EN The following table shows the
relation of the definite article to an accompanying (weak) adjective.

| MASCULINE SINGULAR | NEUTER SINGULAR | FEMININE SINGULAR | PLURAL

Nomin

der
blindE

d^s
blindE

die
bhndLE

die
blincLEAr

Accus

den
blmdEN

Gen.

des
blinds

de
blind

r
[EN

Dat | dem b]mdEN | | den bhndEN