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Questions & Answers about Der Hund ist groß.
Why does the sentence use der instead of die or das for the word "the"?
In German, every noun has a grammatical gender: masculine, feminine, or neuter. Hund (dog) is a masculine noun, so we use the masculine word for "the", which is der.
How do I know der Hund is in the nominative case here?
The nominative case is simply the grammatical term for the subject of a sentence—the person, animal, or thing doing the action or being described. Since the dog is the one being described as big, der Hund is the subject, so it takes the nominative form.
Why is Hund capitalized but groß isn't?
In German, every single noun (a person, place, thing, or idea) is always capitalized, no matter where it appears in the sentence. That is why Hund starts with a capital letter. Words that describe nouns, like the adjective groß (big), are only capitalized if they are the very first word of the sentence.
What is that letter at the end of groß?
That is the ß, called an Eszett or sharp s. It is a special German letter that makes an "s" sound, like the "ss" in the English word "hiss". If your keyboard doesn't have it, it is perfectly acceptable to type gross instead.