Breakdown of Ik zag de pijl in de gang, maar de schat was er niet.
ik
I
zijn
to be
niet
not
maar
but
zien
to see
in
in
er
there (in that place)
de schat
the treasure
de pijl
the arrow
de gang
the hallway
Questions & Answers about Ik zag de pijl in de gang, maar de schat was er niet.
Why do we use er here instead of daar for "there"?
er is the unstressed version of "there". You use it when the place is already known and doesn't need special emphasis. If you wanted to forcefully point and say "the treasure wasn't there!", you would use the stressed word daar.
What place is er replacing in this sentence?
It refers back to in de gang (in the hallway). Just like in English, instead of repeating "but the treasure wasn't in the hallway", Dutch uses the short pronoun er to make the sentence less repetitive.
Why is the order was er niet instead of was niet er?
Because er is a small, unstressed pronoun, it jumps as close to the conjugated verb (was) as possible. The negative word niet usually appears after pronouns, giving us the order was er niet.
I recognize zag as a past tense verb, but what is the infinitive?
zag is the singular past tense of the irregular verb zien (to see). If the subject were plural, like "we", it would become zagen.
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