Breakdown of Zij poetst 's morgens haar tanden.
zij
she
haar
her
's morgens
in the morning
poetsen
to brush
de tand
the tooth
Questions & Answers about Zij poetst 's morgens haar tanden.
Why is there an apostrophe and an 's' in 's morgens?
This is a traditional way of saying "in the morning" or "mornings" when talking about a routine. The 's is short for des, an old word meaning "of the". You will see this same pattern in other routine time words taught in this lesson, like 's middags (in the afternoon), 's avonds (in the evening), and 's nachts (at night).
Why does 's morgens come right after the verb instead of at the end of the sentence?
In English, we usually put the time at the very end ("She brushes her teeth in the morning"). In Dutch, time expressions prefer to sit early in the sentence, right after the main verb. This is part of the "Time, Manner, Place" rule, where time information comes first.
If I start a sentence with 's morgens, how do I capitalize it?
Because the apostrophe stands for missing letters, you never capitalize the s. Instead, you leave the 's lowercase and capitalize the first letter of the full word that follows it. It would look like this: 's Morgens poetst zij haar tanden.
Does the verb poetsen only mean "to brush"?
Poetsen generally means "to clean", "to scrub", or "to polish". When paired with tanden (teeth), it specifically means brushing your teeth. You will also see it used for polishing shoes (schoenen poetsen) or doing heavy cleaning around the house.
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