Breakdown of Der Forscher wird die Knochen wohl aus der ersten Schicht ausgraben.
aus
from / out of (made of)
erste
first (adjective)
werden
will (future auxiliary)
der Knochen
the bone
wohl
probably, I suppose
der Forscher
the researcher
die Schicht
the layer
ausgraben
to excavate
Questions & Answers about Der Forscher wird die Knochen wohl aus der ersten Schicht ausgraben.
The German sentence uses the future tense (wird ausgraben), but the English translation says "is probably excavating" in the present tense. Why?
In German, you can use the future tense to express an assumption about something happening right now. The combination of werden, an infinitive at the end, and a word like wohl shows that you are guessing what the researcher is doing at this very moment.
What exactly does wohl add to this sentence?
Here, wohl acts as a modal particle that means "probably" or "I suppose." It changes the statement from a hard fact into a strong guess. Without wohl, the sentence would sound like a simple prediction about the future: "The researcher will excavate the bones."
Why is it aus der ersten Schicht instead of aus der erste Schicht?
The preposition aus always requires the dative case. Since Schicht (layer) is feminine, the definite article changes from die to der. After a definite article in the dative case, the adjective (erste) must take the -n ending, becoming ersten.
The verb ausgraben is separable. Why isn't the aus- prefix separated and placed at the end of the sentence?
When you use a helping verb like werden, the main verb gets pushed to the very end of the sentence in its full infinitive form. Because it stays in the infinitive, separable verbs like ausgraben do not split.
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