Breakdown of De serveerster aan wie wij fooi gaven bedankte ons glimlachend.
wij
we
aan
to
geven
to give
ons
us
bedanken
to thank
de serveerster
the waitress
wie
whom
de fooi
the tip
glimlachend
smiling
Elon.io is an online learning platform
We have an entire course teaching Dutch grammar and vocabulary.
Questions & Answers about De serveerster aan wie wij fooi gaven bedankte ons glimlachend.
Why is aan wie used instead of die or dat?
In Dutch, when a relative pronoun is governed by a preposition and refers to a person, you use wie with the preposition, not die or dat. So aan wie literally means to whom.
Why does the verb gaven appear at the end in aan wie wij fooi gaven?
That segment is a subordinate clause (a relative clause). In Dutch subordinate clauses the finite verb goes to the end. Therefore gaven comes after wij fooi.
Could we replace aan wie wij fooi gaven with die wij een fooi gaven?
Yes. If you shift to a double-object structure (wij gaven de serveerster een fooi), there’s no preposition, and the relative pronoun for a person is die. You’d get:
De serveerster die wij een fooi gaven bedankte ons glimlachend.
Why is the main verb bedankte in the middle of the sentence and not at the end?
The main clause follows regular Dutch word order: Subject (De serveerster) – finite verb (bedankte) – rest of the sentence. Only subordinate clauses push the verb to the end.
What is ons, and why isn’t it we?
ons is the object form of wij (“we/us”). Since bedankte takes “us” as its object, you use ons, not wij.
What role does glimlachend play here, and why isn’t it inflected?
glimlachend is the adverbial present participle of glimlachen (“to smile”). It describes how the action was performed (“smiling”) and remains uninflected. If it were used attributively (as an adjective) you’d say de glimlachende serveerster with an ending.
Why do we say de serveerster and not het serveerster?
Nouns referring to female persons (especially those ending in -ster) are common-gender in Dutch and always take the definite article de, not het.
Could we start with glimlachend, as in Glimlachend bedankte de serveerster ons?
Yes. Fronting the adverbial participle for emphasis is allowed. Both
De serveerster … bedankte ons glimlachend
and
Glimlachend bedankte de serveerster ons
are correct.