Word
Dat hij het lef had om ons te verraden!
Meaning
That he had the nerve to betray us!
Part of speech
sentence
Pronunciation
Course
Lesson
Breakdown of Dat hij het lef had om ons te verraden!
hij
he / it (referring to a 'de'-word)
hebben
to have
ons
us (object)
dat
that (conjunction)
Questions & Answers about Dat hij het lef had om ons te verraden!
Why does this sentence start with Dat and push the verb had to the end of the clause?
This is an independent exclamatory dat-clause, used to express strong emotion like indignation or surprise. Even though it stands alone as a complete thought, it uses subordinate clause word order, pushing the finite verb (had) to the end of its clause, right before the om ... te phrase. You can think of it as an implied 'I cannot believe [that]...'.
Is lef a common word for 'nerve' in Dutch?
Yes, lef is a very common, everyday word for 'guts', 'courage', or 'nerve' (often in an audacious or negative sense, as used here). It originally comes from Yiddish/Bargoens slang but is completely standard Dutch today.
Why do we use the om ... te + infinitive structure here instead of just te?
While om ... te is most famous for meaning 'in order to', it is also the standard way to link certain abstract nouns to an action. Just like English uses 'the nerve to betray', Dutch connects the noun het lef to the infinitive verraden using the full om ... te construction.
Why is ons placed between om and te verraden?