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De zwemmers zonnen naast de vlag.

De zwemmers zonnen naast de vlag.
The swimmers sunbathe next to the flag.
From Lesson 414:The imperative conditional (en / of)·Dutch

Breakdown of De zwemmers zonnen naast de vlag.

de vlag
the flag
de zwemmer
the swimmer
zonnen
to sunbathe

Questions & Answers about De zwemmers zonnen naast de vlag.

The verb zonnen (to sunbathe) looks exactly like the plural noun for 'suns'. How do we know it is a verb here?
Its position in the sentence gives it away. In a standard Dutch main clause, the conjugated verb is always the second element. Since De zwemmers is the subject occupying the first position, zonnen has to be the verb. Dutch often creates verbs directly from nouns. Because the root noun zon has a short vowel, we double the n when adding the -en ending to preserve that short vowel sound.
Why do we use naast here instead of a preposition like bij?
You could absolutely use bij (near/at), but naast specifically means 'next to' or 'beside'. Using naast paints a much more precise picture that the swimmers are positioned immediately alongside the flag, rather than just somewhere in its general vicinity.
Why does the plural of zwemmer take an -s (zwemmers) instead of -en?
Nouns ending in an unstressed -er, -el, -em, or -en almost always take an -s to form the plural. Since zwemmer (swimmer) is formed by adding the unstressed -er suffix to the verb stem zwem, it follows this rule and becomes zwemmers in the plural.

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