Long vowels in verb stems (maken, ik maak)

Open Syllables and Long Vowels

In Dutch, verbs in their plural or infinitive forms often have "open" syllables. An open syllable ends in a vowel, making the vowel sound long.

Take the verb maken (to make). The syllables break down as ma - ken. Because the first syllable ends with the vowel a, it has a long sound. Plural subjects like wij (we) use this full infinitive form.

Doubling the Vowel for the "Ik" Form

To find the verb stem for ik (I), we drop the -en from the infinitive. For maken, this leaves us with mak.

Because mak now ends in a consonant, the syllable is "closed", which would normally make the a sound short. Dutch spelling aims to keep vowel sounds consistent. To preserve the original long a sound of the infinitive, we double the vowel to make the stem maak.

This same vowel-doubling rule applies to other verbs with a single long vowel before a single consonant, such as slapen (stem: slaap), lopen (stem: loop), and spelen (stem: speel).

The "Jij", "Hij", and "Het" Forms

As with regular verbs, to talk about jij (you), hij (he), zij (she), or het (it), you take the newly formed verb stem and add -t.

The stem of maken is maak, so the form for jij is maakt. The stem of lopen is loop, so the form for het is loopt.

Verbs That Already End in -T

Some verbs, like praten (to talk), follow the vowel-doubling rule to form the stem: praat.

When a verb stem already ends in a -t, we do not add a second one for the jij or hij forms. Dutch words never end in double identical consonants like -tt. Therefore, ik praat and hij praat are spelled exactly the same.