Breakdown of Wat hij gemaild had, was heel nuttig.
zijn
to be
hij
he / it (referring to a 'de'-word)
hebben
to have
wat
what
heel
very
nuttig
useful
mailen
to email
Questions & Answers about Wat hij gemaild had, was heel nuttig.
How do we apply Dutch conjugation rules to form the past participle gemaild?
The infinitive of this English loanword is mailen. To find the correct ending, we look at the sound of the stem. The stem ends in a voiced 'l' sound. Because 'l' is not one of the voiceless consonants in the 't kofschip rule, we add a -d instead of a -t to the stem, along with the standard ge- prefix: ge- + mail + -d = gemaild.
Is it possible to reverse the order of gemaild and had?
Yes! At the end of a subordinate clause, the past participle and the auxiliary verb can appear in either order. Both wat hij gemaild had and wat hij had gemaild are perfectly correct, and Dutch speakers use both interchangeably.
Why do the verbs had and was end up right next to each other, separated only by a comma?
The first part of the sentence, Wat hij gemaild had, is a subordinate clause that acts as the entire subject of the main sentence. Because Dutch follows the V2 (verb second) rule in main clauses, the main verb was must come immediately after that long subject clause, resulting in the had, was sequence.
Why does the sentence start with Wat instead of Dat?
We use wat when referring to an unspecified or independent concept (meaning "that which" or "the thing that"). If you were referring back to a specific het word you just mentioned, like het document, you would use dat instead (het document dat hij gemaild had).
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