Breakdown of We zeggen niet veel.
niet
not
veel
much / many / a lot of
zeggen
to say
we
we (unstressed form of wij)
Questions & Answers about We zeggen niet veel.
Why does zeggen have two gs in the middle?
This is a spelling rule to keep the "e" sound short. The stem of the verb is zeg (a closed syllable with a short "e"). If we just added -en to make the plural, it would be spelled zegen and split into ze-gen. Because ze ends in a vowel (an open syllable), the "e" would become a long sound. To keep the short "e" sound from zeg, we double the consonant to keep the syllable closed: zeg-gen.
Why does niet come after the verb, unlike the English "do not say"?
Dutch doesn't use a helper verb like "do" to make negative sentences. Instead, you just use the main verb and follow it with niet (not). Because the conjugated verb must stay in the second position in a standard sentence, niet comes right after it: We zeggen niet (literally "We say not").
Could I use wij instead of we here?
Yes, but it changes the focus. We is the unstressed, everyday word for "we". Wij is the stressed form. You would use Wij zeggen niet veel if you specifically wanted to emphasize who is being quiet, like saying "We don't say much (but those other people talk constantly)."
Does veel mean "much" or "many"?
It means both! English has separate words depending on whether you can count the item ("much time" vs. "many cats"), but Dutch simply uses veel for both countable and uncountable things. In this sentence, it translates to "much".
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