Breakdown of De Pyreneeën grenzen aan de oceaan.
de Pyreneeën
the Pyrenees
grenzen aan
to border on
de oceaan
the ocean
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Questions & Answers about De Pyreneeën grenzen aan de oceaan.
Why do we use the plural article de and the plural verb grenzen for a single mountain range?
In Dutch, mountain ranges are treated as grammatically plural proper nouns. Because of this, they take the plural definite article de and require a plural verb to match. Other common examples that work exactly the same way include de Alpen (the Alps) and de Ardennen (the Ardennes).
If this mountain range appeared in the middle of a sentence, would the article de be capitalized?
No. Unlike some places that have an article permanently frozen into their official name (like Den Haag), the de before mountain ranges is just a standard definite article. If it were not at the beginning of the sentence, you would write de Pyreneeën with a lowercase d.
Why does the word Pyreneeën have a trema (two dots) on the final e?
The trema is used to show where a new syllable begins so you don't misread the vowels. Because Dutch often combines vowels, eee would look like one confusing vowel chunk. The dots on the third e tell you to pronounce the final en as a separate syllable.
In English we just say "border the ocean". Why is there an aan in this Dutch sentence?
The Dutch verb grenzen (to border) requires the fixed preposition aan. You cannot use it with a direct object like you do in English. It helps to translate it literally in your head as "to border on" or "to be adjacent to".