Nominative relative clauses (der, die, das)

Relative clauses and pronouns

To give more details about a person or object—like identifying a suspect or describing a piece of evidence—you can use a relative clause. These are subordinate clauses that act like adjectives, usually translating to "who," "which," or "that" in English.

In German, the relative pronoun must match the gender of the noun it is describing. In this lesson, the relative pronoun is the subject of its own clause (the person or thing doing the action), so it takes the nominative case.

Conveniently, the nominative relative pronouns are exactly the same as the definite articles:

• der for masculine nouns
• die for feminine nouns
• das for neuter nouns

Word order and commas

Because a relative clause is a subordinate clause, the relative pronoun sits at the beginning and pushes the conjugated verb to the very end of the clause.

You must always separate a relative clause from the main clause with commas. If the relative clause sits right in the middle of a sentence, directly after the noun it describes, it gets a comma on both sides.

If the relative clause describes a noun at the end of the main sentence, it simply attaches to the end, separated by a single comma.

Matching gender

Always look at the gender of the noun being described to choose the correct relative pronoun. A neuter noun like das Auto requires the relative pronoun das, while a feminine noun like die Waffe requires die.

Notice that the relative pronoun only takes its gender from the noun it describes. Its case (nominative) comes from its role inside the relative clause, even if the noun it describes is in the accusative or dative case in the main clause.