Breakdown of Ik heb zulke tedere tranen in haar ogen gezien.
ik
I
hebben
to have
zien
to see
in
in
haar
her
zulke
such
het oog
the eye
de traan
the tear
teder
tender
Questions & Answers about Ik heb zulke tedere tranen in haar ogen gezien.
The current lesson is about making nouns from adjectives with the suffix -de, like liefde. Can we do that with teder to mean 'tenderness'?
No. While lief becomes liefde and koud becomes koude, the adjective teder (tender) takes a different suffix to become a noun: tederheid. The -de suffix only applies to a specific, closed group of adjectives that you generally have to memorize.
Why does the sentence use zulke here instead of zo'n?
We use zulke because tranen (tears) is a plural noun. Zo'n is a contraction of zo een (such a), so it can only be used with singular, countable nouns. If you were talking about just one tear, you would say zo'n tedere traan.
Why is the adjective tedere spelled with a single 'e' in the first syllable even though it has a long vowel sound?
The base word is teder. When you add the grammatical -e ending to match the plural noun tranen, the word breaks into syllables as te-de-re. Because the first syllable ends in a vowel, making it an open syllable, Dutch spelling rules dictate that the long 'e' sound is spelled with just one letter. The second and third 'e's are pronounced as a short 'uh' sound, known as a schwa.
Is there a specific reason the past participle gezien is placed at the very end of the sentence instead of right after the object?
This is a classic Dutch word order rule that is always good to review. In the present perfect tense, the conjugated helping verb heb takes the second position in the main clause, and the past participle gezien is pushed to the absolute end. Everything else, including the descriptive phrase in haar ogen, gets sandwiched between them.
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