A concrete noun names something you can point at — tafel (table), hond (dog), boek (book). An abstract noun names something you cannot: a quality, a state, an activity, an idea — vryheid (freedom), hoogte (height), kennis (knowledge), vriendskap (friendship). The interesting part for a learner is not the philosophical distinction but the machinery: Afrikaans has a small set of highly productive suffixes that manufacture abstract nouns from adjectives and verbs, and these abstractions then behave differently in the grammar — above all, they mostly refuse to be pluralised. Knowing the suffixes lets you both understand and coin abstract nouns; knowing how they behave keeps you from the classic error of putting them in the plural. (This page focuses on the abstract/concrete split; the full inventory of suffixes is on the suffixes overview.)
The five workhorses
Five suffixes do most of the work. Each has a typical base (adjective or verb) and a typical meaning.
| Suffix | Builds from | Meaning | Example |
|---|---|---|---|
| -heid | adjectives | the quality of being X | vry → vryheid (freedom) |
| -ing | verbs | the action / its result | beweeg → beweging (movement) |
| -te | adjectives | the measurable quality of X | hoog → hoogte (height) |
| -nis | verbs / adjectives | state or product | ken → kennis (knowledge) |
| -skap | nouns / adjectives | condition, relationship, collective | vriend → vriendskap (friendship) |
-heid: quality from an adjective
-heid is the all-purpose quality-maker, attaching to adjectives to name "the state of being X". It is the closest equivalent of English -ness / -ity, and it is extremely productive — if you have an adjective, you can almost always build its -heid noun.
Vryheid is nie iets wat 'n mens gratis kry nie.
Freedom is not something you get for free.
Sy eerlikheid het almal beïndruk.
His honesty impressed everyone.
Met sy gesondheid gaan dit nou baie beter.
His health is doing much better now.
-ing: action from a verb
-ing turns a verb into the name of its action or the result of that action, much like English -ing / -tion. Beweeg (to move) → beweging (movement, motion); reken (to calculate) → rekening (account, bill); oplos (to solve / dissolve) → oplossing (solution).
Die beweging van die aandele was skerp vandag.
The movement of the shares was sharp today.
Ek wag nog vir die rekening.
I'm still waiting for the bill.
Daar is nie 'n maklike oplossing nie.
There isn't an easy solution.
-te: the transparent deadjectival pattern
This is the suffix worth dwelling on, because it is where Afrikaans is more regular than English. -te attaches to a (usually one-syllable) adjective and names the measurable extent of that quality: hoog (high) → hoogte (height), diep (deep) → diepte (depth), lank (long) → lengte (length), breed (wide) → breedte (width), warm (warm) → warmte (warmth), groot (big) → grootte (size).
English does this irregularly — high → height, deep → depth, long → length, wide → width — with a different vowel change and a different ending almost every time, so you have to memorise each one. Afrikaans does it with one transparent suffix: take the adjective, add -te. The pattern is so regular that you can read off the meaning of an unfamiliar -te noun the moment you recognise the adjective inside it.
Die hoogte van die berg is amper drieduisend meter.
The height of the mountain is almost three thousand metres.
Ons moet die diepte van die water meet.
We have to measure the depth of the water.
Die lengte en die breedte stem nie ooreen nie.
The length and the width don't match.
-nis and -skap
-nis is less productive but lives in some very common words: ken (to know) → kennis (knowledge), getuig (to testify) → getuienis (testimony), gebeur (to happen) → gebeurtenis (event), droef (sad) → droefenis (sorrow). Treat the -nis nouns largely as fixed vocabulary rather than a productive pattern.
-skap names a condition, a relationship, or a collective: vriend (friend) → vriendskap (friendship), broer (brother) → broederskap (brotherhood), eienaar (owner) → eienaarskap (ownership), wetenskap (science, literally "the state of knowing"). It is the rough counterpart of English -ship / -hood.
Hulle vriendskap het dekades lank gehou.
Their friendship lasted for decades.
Kennis is nie dieselfde as wysheid nie.
Knowledge is not the same as wisdom.
How abstract nouns behave: the die article and the missing plural
Two grammatical consequences follow from a noun being abstract, and both trip English speakers.
First, abstract nouns used in their general sense take the definite article die when English would use no article at all. English says "Freedom is precious" with a bare noun; Afrikaans very often says Die vryheid is kosbaar — the article generalises rather than picking out one specific freedom. (English does the same with "the truth", but extends it much less widely than Afrikaans.)
Die liefde is geduldig.
Love is patient. (general sense, but die in Afrikaans)
Die vryheid kom nie sonder 'n prys nie.
Freedom doesn't come without a price.
Second, and more important for avoiding errors: most abstract nouns are mass nouns and resist the plural, exactly as in English. You do not pluralise freedom, honesty, health, knowledge — and you do not pluralise vryheid, eerlikheid, gesondheid, kennis. There is no kennisse meaning "knowledges", just as there is no English "knowledges". When you need to count, you count a container word: stukke kennis (pieces of knowledge), vorme van vryheid (forms of freedom). (The mass/count split is treated fully on mass and count nouns.)
Sy het baie kennis, maar min ervaring.
She has a lot of knowledge but little experience. (no plural on kennis or ervaring)
Daar is verskillende vorme van vryheid.
There are different forms of freedom. (count the container, not the abstraction)
The qualification: when an abstraction is reified — used to mean a concrete instance or product rather than the quality itself — it can pluralise. Hoogte as "height" (the quality) has no natural plural, but hoogtes as "high points / heights" (concrete places) is fine; skoonheid as "beauty" resists the plural, but skoonhede as "beauties / beautiful things" exists in elevated or literary use. The rule is therefore not "abstract nouns can never pluralise" but "they don't pluralise in their abstract sense — only when they shift to a concrete, countable meaning".
Die roete klim oor verskeie hoogtes.
The route climbs over several high points. (concrete, so plural is fine)
Common mistakes
❌ Sy het baie kennisse oor die onderwerp.
Incorrect — kennis is a mass noun; it has no plural in the 'knowledge' sense.
✅ Sy het baie kennis oor die onderwerp.
She has a lot of knowledge about the subject.
❌ Vryheid is kosbaar. (modelled on English bare noun)
Often needs the article — the general sense usually takes die.
✅ Die vryheid is kosbaar.
Freedom is precious.
❌ hoogheid (for 'height')
Incorrect — the measurable quality of hoog is hoogte; hoogheid would mean 'highness/majesty'.
✅ hoogte
height.
❌ vriendheid (for 'friendship')
Incorrect — relationship nouns take -skap, not -heid: vriendskap.
✅ vriendskap
friendship.
❌ groote (for 'size')
Incorrect — the base groot already ends in t, so the suffix gives double t: grootte.
✅ grootte
size.
Key takeaways
- Afrikaans builds abstract nouns with five productive suffixes: -heid (quality, from adjectives), -ing (action, from verbs), -te (measurable quality, from adjectives), -nis and -skap (state / relationship). See the suffixes overview.
- -te is the standout pattern: where English is irregular (high/height, deep/depth, long/length), Afrikaans just adds -te to the adjective (hoog → hoogte, diep → diepte). Mind the double tt in grootte.
- Pick the right suffix: a quality is -heid (hoogheid = "majesty", not "height"); a measurable extent is -te; a relationship is -skap (vriendskap, not vriendheid).
- Abstract nouns in their general sense usually take the article die (die liefde, die vryheid), where English uses a bare noun.
- Abstract nouns are mass nouns and don't pluralise in their abstract sense — count a container instead (stukke kennis, vorme van vryheid). See mass and count nouns.
- They can pluralise only when reified into a concrete, countable meaning (hoogtes = "high points").
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Start learning Afrikaans→Related Topics
- Derivational Suffixes: -heid, -ing, -er, -lik, -baarB1 — The productive suffixes that build new Afrikaans words from old ones — noun-formers -heid, -ing, -er, -te and adjective-formers -lik, -baar, -loos, -ig — what each one does and where English cognates mislead.
- Derived Nouns: Agents, Actions, QualitiesB1 — How Afrikaans builds nouns from verbs and adjectives — agent and instrument nouns in -er/-aar, action nouns in -ing, and the workhorse abstract suffix -heid — with their plurals and the few traps.
- Mass and Count Nouns; Measure PhrasesB1 — Why mass nouns like water and geld resist plurals, how Afrikaans measures them with phrases like twee glase wyn, and the key difference from English: no 'of'.
- Collective and Uncountable NounsB2 — Afrikaans collective nouns are firmly singular — die span speel, die polisie soek — and uncountables like inligting never take a plural -s.
- Word Formation: OverviewA2 — Afrikaans builds new words with a small but powerful toolkit — a pervasive diminutive, solid compounding, prefixes and suffixes, and a distinctive reduplication that English handles with separate words.