La domo havas fenestron.

to have

Breakdown of La domo havas fenestron.

• domo: the house
• fenestro: the window

Questions & Answers about La domo havas fenestron.

Why does fenestron end with -n?

In Esperanto, we add -n to the end of a word if it's a direct object. Here, fenestron is the thing that the house has, so it requires that -n to show it's the object of the verb havas.

Why do we say La domo instead of just domo?

In Esperanto, la is the definite article that corresponds roughly to the in English. If you want to say the house, you use la domo. If you just say domo, it’s more like saying a house or just house in a general sense.

Where is the indefinite article (like a) in this sentence?

Esperanto doesn't use an indefinite article at all. So, if you want to say a window, you just say fenestro. Meanwhile, la is the only article, and it always means the.

Why do we use havas instead of estas?

Havas means to have, indicating possession. Estas means to be, which you’d use for identifying or describing something. Saying La domo havas fenestron = The house has a window. If you used La domo estas fenestro, it would mean The house is a window, which makes no sense here.

Why is it fenestron and not fenestro?

When it's the object directly receiving the action of havas, you need that -n ending to mark the accusative case. If the word were simply the subject of a sentence, you'd see fenestro (without -n).