High German

High German, or Hochdeutsch, is the name of the standard form of Modern German. It is a West Germanic and is related to Low German, Dutch, and Anglo-Saxon/Modern English. Today it is the official language of Germany, Switzerland, and Austria.

High German HochDeutsch
Spoken in:	Germany, Switzerland, Austria (Deutschland, Schweiz, Österreich)
Conworld:	Real world
Total speakers:	105 million
Genealogical classification:	Indo-European Germanic West Germanic      German High German
Basic word order:	SVO, OVS/V2
Morphological type:	inflecting
Morphosyntactic alignment:	nominative-accusative
Writing system:
Created by:
unknown	1800-Present C.E.

Difference between High and Low German

High German differs from other West German languages such as Low German, English, and Dutch in that High German when through the High German Consonant Shift. The High German Consonant Shift (or HGCS) is the sound shift where;

1. Non-geminated voicless stops became fricatives,
2. Geminated and liquid-adjacent voiceless stops became affricates,
3. Voiced stops became voiceless stops, and finally
4. All interdental fricatives (/ð/ and /θ/) became the dental stop and/or Alveolar stop /d̻/ and /d/.
   

The last stage was shared by Low German and Dutch.

All of these stages occur in the Highest of High German dialects, but Standard High German does not have all of them. The shift of /k/>/kx/ in stage 2 did not occur in the standard, although it did in Upper German dialects, such as Bavarian. Also the only part of stage 3 which actually became part of standard High German was /d/>/t/. The other two happened only in the Highest of High German or Upper German dialects

Orthography

High German is written with the Latin alphabet. It has extra letters which represent some of the sounds of the German language, which are not otherwise found in the Latin alphabet. These include Ö ö, Ü ü, Ä ä, ß.

Phonology

Consonants

Consonants
	Bilabial		Labiod.		Alveolar		Post-alv.		Palatal		Velar		Glottal
Nasal		m				n						ŋ
Plosive	p	b			t	d					k	g
Fricative			f	v	s	z	ʃ	(ʒ)		ç	x		h
Affricate			pf		ʦ		ʧ	(ʤ)			(kx)
Approximants										j
Trill						r
Lateral Approximant						l

• The diagraph ch is /x/ after a back vowel, and /ç/ elsewhere.
• v and f are (usually) both pronounced /f/, and w is pronounced /v/.
• /ŋ/ occurs as ng and /ŋk/ is nk.
• sch is pronounced /ʃ/. tsch is pronounced /ʧ/.
• Initially s is pronounced /z/ before vowels, and /ʃ/ before a consonant (such as st and sp).
• j is pronounced /j/.
• The spellings tz and z are pronounced /ʦ/.
• ß and ss are pronounced /s/.
• German has final devoicing. This means that all voiced consonants with voiceless forms become those voiceless forms, at the end of the word.

Vowels

Vowels
	Front		Central	Back
	Unround	Rounded	Unrounded	Rounded
High	iː - ɪ	yː - ʏ		uː - ʊ
Mid	eː - ɛ	øː - œ	ə	oː - ɔ
Low			aː/a
All entries are: Tense - Lax

• In order to form the long version of a vowel, add -h after the vowel.
• Final e is pronounced /ə/.
• ü is pronounced /yː/, /ʏ/.
• ö is pronounced /øː/, /œ/.
• ä is pronounced /eː/, /ɛ/.

Diphthongs

• eu and äu are pronounced /oj/.
• ei and ai are pronounced /aj/.
• au is pronounced /aw/.

Grammar

The General Stuff

Gender and Number

Nouns, Adjectives, Articles, and to some extent Pronouns all affected by Gender and Number. There are three genders and two numbers in High German. The three genders are Masculine, Feminine, and Neuter, and the numbers are Singular and Plural. Usually all forms of the Plural are the same, when it comes to adjectives and articles.

Case

In German, there are four cases, Nominative, Accusative, Genitive, and Dative. These affect articles, pronouns, adjectives, and nouns. The prepositions of German also affect whether an phrase is genitive, dative, or accusative.

Articles

There are definite articles and indefinite articles in German as well as in English. Articles are affected by case, gender, and number. The plural is the same across the genders.

Definite

Cases	Masculine	Feminine	Neuter	Plural (all Genders)
Nominative	der	die	das	die
Genitive	des	der	des	der
Dative	dem	der	dem	den
Accusative	den	die	das	die

Indefinite

Cases	Masculine	Feminine	Neuter	Plural (all Genders)
Nominative	ein	eine	ein	meine†
Genitive	eines	einer	eines	meinen
Dative	einem	einer	einem	meinen
Accusative	einen	eine	ein	meine

† There is no plural form of ein, but there are other indefinite article-style words that do, such as mein which means my.

Nouns

Gender is arbitrary in German, but Nouns referring to living being usually are the gender of that being. The ending of a noun is usually helpful in figuring out which gender a noun is, although it is not always the case.

Also, the first letter all German nouns is always capitalized.

Genders of Nouns

• Masculine
  • Nouns ending with -en are usually masculine (that are not derived from verbs). Ex. Der Garten, der Norden.
  • Nouns ending -er are usually masculine. Ex. Der Lehrer, die Amerikaner
  • Nouns ending with -ismus are masculine. Ex. Der Feminismus, Der Kommunismus,
• Feminine
  • To convert masculine nouns ending to feminine, add -in to it. Ex. Die Lehrerin, Die Freundin.
  • Most nouns ending with -e. Ex. Die Frage, Die Straße,
  • Nouns ending with -ion, -ik, -ie, -unft, -tät, -ei, -heit, -keit, -schaft, and -ung are almost always feminine. Ex. Die Logik, Die Magie, Die Universität, Die Voresung, Die Gesundheit, etc.
• Neuter
  • Young living beings are Neuter. Ex. Das Kind, Das Lamm, Das Baby,
  • The ending -chen and -lein are diminutives and are always neuter. Ex. Das Mädchen, Das Märchen.
    

-lein is used more in the south than in the north, so it's less common in the standard form of German.

• • Metals and infinitive-nouns are always neuter. Ex. Das Gold, Das Metall, Das Singen, Das Essen,

Forming the Plural

The formation of the plural is different for many different nouns. The idea of the Umlaut is important in forming the plural as well.

• For monosyllabic words, the plural is usually for by adding -e in the masculine and feminine and -er in some neuter nouns.
• For Polysyllabic masculine and neuter nouns, many take no ending, but most others take -e as an ending.
• For most Polysyllabic feminine nouns that end with -e, -er or -el, the ending is -n or -en. If the ending is -in then the total ending is -innen.
• Foreign words (except those from Latin) and new words usually take the ending -s.

Noun Declensions

There are many different kinds of German Nouns. Here are a few fully declined ones:
Masculine:

Cases	Tag 'Day'	Tage 'Days'	Apfel 'Apple'	Äpfel'Apples'
Nominative	Der Tag	Die Tage	Der Apfel	Die Äpfel
Genitive	Des Tag(e)s	Der Tage	Des Apfels	Der Äpfel
Dative	Dem Tag(e)	Den Tagen	Dem Apfel	Den Äpfeln
Accusative	Den Tag	Die Tage	Den Apfel	Die Äpfel

Feminine:

Cases	Hand 'Hand'	Hände 'Hands'	Freude 'Joy'	Freuden 'Joys'
Nominative	Die Hand	Die Hände	Die Freude	Die Freuden
Genitive	Der Hand	Der Hände	Der Freude	Der Freuden
Dative	Der Hand	Den Händen	Der Freude	Den Freuden
Accusative	Die Hand	Die Hände	Die Freude	Die Freuden

Neuter:

Cases	Schiff 'Ship'	Schiffe 'Ships'	Volk 'Folk, People'	Völker 'Folks, Peoples'
Nominative	Das Schiff	Die Schiffe	Das Volk	Die Völker
Genitive	Des Schiff(e)s	Der Schiffe	Des Volk(e)s	Der Völker
Dative	Dem Schiff(e)	Den Schiffen	Dem Volk(e)	Den Völkern
Accusative	Das Schiff	Die Schiffe	Das Folk	Die Völker

Personal Pronouns

First person:

Cases	Singular	Plural
Nominative	ich	wir
Genitive	mein	unser
Dative	mir	uns
Accusative	mich	uns

Second person:

Cases	Singular Informal	Plural Informal	Plural/Singular Formal
Nominative	du	ihr	Sie‡
Genitive	dein	euer	Ihr
Dative	dir	euch	Ihnen
Accusative	dich	euch	Sie

‡The formal plural pronoun Sie is the same form as the 3rd person plural pronoun sie but is also always capitalized.

Third person:

Cases	Mascu. Sing.	Fem. Sing.	Neut. Sing.	Plural
Nominative	er	sie	es	sie
Genitive	sein	ihr	sein	ihr
Dative	ihm	ihr	ihm	ihnen
Accusative	ihn	sie	es	sie

Adjectives and Adverbs

Adjectives

German adjectives have different behaviours and patterns depending on whether there are articles or not, and whether those articles are definite or indefinite. Predicate adjectives take no endings.

Gut = Good With Definite articles and demonstratives, so-called der-Words:

Cases	Masculine	Feminine	Neuter	Plural (all Genders)
Nominative	Der gute Hund	Die gute Katze	Das gute Boot	Die guten Völker
Genitive	Des guten Hundes	Der guten Katze	Des guten Bootes	Der guten Völker
Dative	Dem guten Hunde	Der guten Katze	Dem guten Boot	Den guten Völkern
Accusative	Den guten Hund	Die gute Katze	Das gute Boot	Die guten Völker

With the Indefinite articles and possessives, so-called ein-words:

Cases	Masculine	Feminine	Neuter	Plural (all Genders)
Nominative	ein guter Hund	eine gute Katze	ein gutes Boot	Meine guten Völker
Genitive	eines guten Hundes	einer guten Katze	eines guten Bootes	Meiner guten Völker
Dative	einem guten Hunde	einer guten Katze	einem guten Boot	Meinen guten Völkern
Accusative	einen guten Hund	eine gute Katze	ein gutes Boot	Meine guten Völker

Articles without articles of any form:

Cases	Masculine	Feminine	Neuter	Plural (all Genders)
Nominative	guter Hund	gute Katze	gutes Boot	Meine guten Völker
Genitive	guten Hundes	guter Katze	guten Bootes	Meiner guten Völker
Dative	gutem Hunde	guter Katze	gutem Boot	Meinen guten Völkern
Accusative	guten Hund	gute Katze	gutes Boot	Meine guten Völker

Adverbs

In High German, the change from an adjective to an adverb does not require an ending, as it would in Modern English or French. The adverb form is usually the same as the nominative masculine form of the adjective.

The Word Order for Adverbs usually follows a pattern of the ordering of 1. Time, 2. Manner, and 3. Place. This means Gut in German can mean both well and good. There are other words which are strictly adverbs, such as sehr, which means very.

Prepositions

Prepositions are classified by the cases that follow them. Some have the accusative case follow, some the dative, and some the genitive. However some take either accusative or dative, based on whether or not it is a there is motion involved.

Accusative

bis - until, as far as
durch - through, by means of
entlang - along, down
für - for
gegen - against, around
ohne - without
um - around

Dative

aus - out of, from, made of,
außer - at,
bei - at, near, with,
gegenüber von, opposite, across from,
mit - with
nach - to, after, according to,
seit - since, for a period of time,
von - from, of, by
zu - to

Accusative and Dative

an - on, to go to,
auf - on, to, in, at
hinter - behind,
in - in, into, to,
neben - next to, beside,
über - over, above, across,
unter - under,
vor - in front of, before
zwischen - between,

Genitive

anstatt - instead of,
statt - instead of,
trotz - in spite of
während - during
wegen - because of,

Conjunctions

There are different conjunctions which affect a sentence in different ways. Coordinating Conjunctions usually do not affect the word or of a German sentence, whereas Subordinating Conjunctions usually involve the transposed word order mentioned below.

Coordinating Conjunctions

aber - but
denn - because, for
oder - or
sondern - but, rather,
und - and

Subordinating Conjunctions

als, wann, wenn - when
bevor - before
bis - until
da - since,
damit - so that,
dass - that
ob - whether, if
obwohl - although
seit - since
während - while
weil - because
wenn - if

Verbs

German Verbs have two major subdivisions, Strong and Weak. German verbs are conjugated according to 3 persons, 2 numbers, 2 inflecting tenses, and 3 moods, although German is rather intermediate when it comes to verbal inflection.

The infinitive of a verb is formed by adding -en to the end.

The imperative is formed, in the 2nd person singular informal by only the verb stem, the 2nd person plural informal is formed by adding -t to the stem. The 2nd personal formal is formed by adding -en to the stem and adding Sie afterwards. The "let's" or first person plural imperative is formed by adding -en and wir after words. Examples: Verb: Gehen - to go
Geh nach Hause!
Geht nach Hause!
Gehen Sie nach Hause!
Go home!
Gehen wir nach Hause - let's go home.

Modals

There are a few verbs which are essential for German. These are called Modals or Modal Auxiliaries. There are 6 primary modals, and one which has a subjunctive form in common use. The latter would be Möchten which is the subjunctive of Mögen. The modal in the present tense is as follows:

Present tense

Infinitive

dürfen may, to be allowed

können can, to be able,

müssen must, to have to,

sollen should,

mögen to like,

möchten would like,

wollen to want,

sing.

pl.

sing.

pl.

sing.

pl.

sing.

pl.

sing.

pl.

sing.

pl.

sing.

pl.

1st person

darf

dürfen

kann

können

muss

müssen

soll

sollen

mag

mögen

möchte

möchten

will

wollen

2nd person

darfst

dürft

kannst

könnt

musst

müsst

sollst

sollt

magst

mögt

möchtest

möchtet

willst

wollt

3rd person

darf

dürfen

kann

können

muss

müssen

soll

sollen

mag

mögen

möchte

möchten

will

wollen

Auxiliaries

The most important auxiliaries are sein (to be), werden (to become, shall, will), and haben (to have). Sein and Haben are both used to form the Present Perfect tense, and Werden is used to form the Future tense.

Present tense
Infinitive	Sein to be		Haben to have		Werden to become
	sing.	pl.	sing.	pl.	sing.	pl.
1st person	bin	sind	habe	haben	werde	werden
2nd person	bist	seid	hast	habt	wirst	werdet
3rd person	ist	sind	hat	haben	wird	werden
Imperfect Tense
	sing.	pl.	sing.	pl.	sing.	pl.
1st person	war	waren	hatte	hatten	wurde	wurden
2nd person	warst	wart	hattest	hattet	wurdest	wurdet
3rd person	war	waren	hatte	hatten	wurde	wurden
Perfect Form
	sing.	pl.	sing.	pl.	sing.	pl.
1st person	bin gewesen	sind gewesen	habe gehabt	haben gehabt	bin geworden	sind geworden
2nd person	bist gewesen	seid gewesen	hast gehabt	habt gehabt	bist geworden	seid geworden
3rd person	ist gewesen	sind gewesen	hat gehabt	haben gehabt	ist geworden	sind geworden

Present Tense

In the present tense, German verbs follow a common pattern. Quite a few verbs have change or umlaut the vowel in the second person informal singular and the third person singular. Verbs that end with an alveolar fricative or affricate have identical du-forms and er, sie, es forms. Verbs ending -d or -t insert an -e- in the du, ihr, and er, sie, es forms. Here are examples:

Present tense
Infinitive	Lernen To Learn		Antworten to answer		Heißen to be called		Fahren to drive, go
	sing.	pl.	sing.	pl.	sing.	pl.	sing.	pl.
1st person	lerne	lernen	antworte	antworten	heiße	heißen	fahre	fahren
2nd person	lernst	lernt	antwortest	antwortet	heißt	heißt	fährst	fahrt
3rd person	lernt	lernen	antwortet	antworten	heißt	heißen	fährt	fahren

Perfect Tense

The present perfect is used in High German in the same senses that English uses the Simple Past and the Perfect tenses. For weak verbs, in order to form the Present tense, first a form of haben (or sein) must be used, and at the end of the clause comes the verb. For the verb, ge- must be attached to beginning of the stem and -t must be attached to the end. In many strong verbs, ge- is still often attached, but sometimes -en is the ending. Also many strong verbs involve a vowel stem change as well.

Most Verbs take haben as the auxiliary verb, but verbs of motion and select others take the verb sein as the auxiliary.

Present Perfect Tense
Infinitive	Lernen To Learn		Antworten to answer		Heißen to be called		Fahren to drive, go
	sing.	pl.	sing.	pl.	sing.	pl.	sing.	pl.
1st person	habe gelernt	haven gelernt	habe geantwortet	haben geantwortet	habe geheißen	haben geheißen	habe gefahren	haben gefahren
2nd person	hast gelernt	habt gelernt	hast geantwortet	habt geantwortet	hast geheißen	habt geheißen	hast gefahren	habt fahren
3rd person	hat gelernt	haben gelernt	hat geantwortet	haben geantwortet	hat geheißen	haben geheißen	hat gefahren	haben gefahren

Imperfect

Imperfect tense
Infinitive	Lernen To Learn		Antworten to answer		Heißen to be called		Fahren to drive, go
	sing.	pl.	sing.	pl.	sing.	pl.	sing.	pl.
1st person	lernte	lernten	antwortete	antworteten	heißte	heißten	fuhr	fuhren
2nd person	lerntest	lerntet	antwortetest	antwortetet	heißtest	heißtet	fuhrst	fuhrt
3rd person	lernte	lernten	antwortete	antworteten	heißte	heißten	fuhr	fuhren

Word Order

German word order is fairly unique and has particular features with which a learner must become acquainted. The normal order is SVO, and occasional OVS, because German has a structure know as V_{2 or 2nd Position Verb rule, as described here:}

"...I find German to be the strangest in the area of syntax. German has several interesting word order issues. Now a simple German sentence can be SVO. But German, as well as most other Germanic language such as Norwegian, Danish, Swedish, and Dutch, follow what I call the 2nd Position Verb rule. This states that no matter where the objects and subjects move, the conjugated verb or Finite verb stays in the second position. So this means that SVO or OVS are very common. Here is an example, You can say in German: Ich sehe den Himmel. (I see the sky.) or Den Himmel sehe ich. (The sky see I.) We can see how the verb stays when the other elements move. Now for questions it is acceptable to have a verb in the first position, using a standard inverted word order. However for many statements the verb second ideal needs to stay in place." [1] Timothy Patrick Snyder

However, German and Dutch both have a unique trait in having something called Transposed or Dependent Clause word order. This type of word order only occurs inside dependent clauses, and what happens is that the inflected or finite verb is sent to the end. It is described as this:

"Now the pattern that Dutch and German have, but is not really shared with the other Germanic languages, is the movement of the conjugated verb to the end of a dependent clause. This might seem strange at first, but one must learn to notice it. And example would be: Der Mann, den ich gestern sah, ist gelassen. (The man, whom I yesterday saw, left.) Instead of; The man, whom I saw yesterday, left." [2] Timothy Patrick Snyder

Another interesting feature is the movement of the Infinitives and Past Participles to the end of the sentence. This is a trait that written German got from Latin, and then it became common in spoken German as well. It also leads to idioms such as Ich kann Deutsch. (Lit. I can German, but means, I can speak German) which comes from the expression "Ich kann Deutsch sprechen." In the cases of Transposed word order, the inverted verb goes after the infinitives and participles.

Sources and External Links

An Intro to Foreign Word Order by Timothy Patrick Snyder

Stern, Guy, and Everett Bleiler. Essential German Grammar. Mineola, New York. Dover Publications inc, 1961.

Dippmann, Gerda, and Johanna Watzinger-Tharp. A Practical review of German Grammar. New Jersey, Prentice-Hall inc. 2000.

Page written by Timothy Patrick Snyder.

Translations