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The Bremen Town Musicians

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Pyx
Diglot
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China
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670 posts - 892 votes 
Speaks: German*, English
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 Message 9 of 11
11 February 2010 at 7:09am | IP Logged 
In this case 'Herr' doesn't mean 'Mister' but 'Master', if that is any help for you.
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adoggie
Bilingual Diglot
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 Message 10 of 11
12 February 2010 at 9:28am | IP Logged 
Thanks, Pyx, for your information. But, I'd still like to have a look at a list of all of the n-nouns in German. They don't really have this information readily available online, I don't think.
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tikho
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Studies: Dutch

 
 Message 11 of 11
13 February 2010 at 1:34am | IP Logged 
[I edited this after finding more information]


There seem to be two main determinates for n-nouns. To say it at the beginning, they are all masculine nouns.


(1) Ends in "-e" and describes humans or animals.

der Affe, der Bote, der Bube, der Bulle, der Bursche, der Erbe, der Experte, der Gefährte, der Genosse, der Hase, der Heide, der Hirte, der Insasse, der Jude, der Junge, der Knabe, der Kollege, der Komplize, der Kollege, der Kunde, der Laie, der Lotse, der Löwe, der Nachkomme, der Neffe, der Ochse, der Pate, der Rabe, der Riese, der Sklave, der Zeuge


(2) Foreign endings (mostly from Greek?)

"-and", "-ant", "-at", "-ent", "-et", "-ist", "-oge", "-nom", "-soph", "-graf"

der Doktorand, der Elefant, der Kandidat, der Absolvent, der Athlet, der Planet, der Journalist, der Psychologe, der Ökonom, der Philosoph, der Fotograf

These are mostly humans or animals again, but it includes all masculine nouns with these endings. For example: der Telegraph (des Telegrafen, den Telegrafen, dem Telegrafen), but not das Autograf.


(3) A few other masculine nouns describing humans or animals that have no special endings:

der Bär, der Bauer, der Christ, der Fürst, der Held, der Herr, der Kamerad, der Mensch, der Nachbar, der Prinz, der Soldat


(4) A few non-animates ending in "-e" (1). These also have unusual genitive forms (the "en" from n-Deklination along with the usual "s"). Der Name (des Namens, den Namen, dem Namen); Der Gedanke (des Gedankens, den Gedanken, dem Gedanken); der Buchstabe (des Buchstabens, den Buchstaben, dem Buchstaben)... but not der Käse (des Käse, den Käse, dem Käse).


One last weird one that fits nowhere: das Herz, des Herzens, das Herz, dem Herzen/dem Herz.


It seems like (3) spread from the idea "describing men or animals," and (4) from idea of a category of endings. In any case, I didn't find any full lists.

http://books.google.com/books?id=Df7ZE9AcCwMC&pg=PA14
http://deutschlernen-blog.de/das-substantiv-die-n-deklinatio n/

Edited by tikho on 14 February 2010 at 11:34am



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