Learn Hardcore German: Der Rest der Landschaft riecht nach Gras, Heu und frischer Luft. - The rest of the landscape smells of grass, hay and fresh air.

Der Rest
- Rest is a masculine noun.
- der here is nominative singular, because “Der Rest” is the subject of the sentence.
der Landschaft
- This is genitive singular, meaning “of the landscape”.
- Landschaft is feminine, and the genitive singular article for feminine nouns is der.

So the structure is:

Der Rest (nominative subject)
der Landschaft (feminine genitive: “of the landscape”)

Together: “The rest of the landscape”.

Why is it “der Landschaft” and not “die Landschaft”?

“Die Landschaft” is the nominative (and accusative) form: “the landscape”.

In “Der Rest der Landschaft”, Landschaft is not the subject; it’s part of a “of-phrase” (the rest of the landscape). In German, that “of” is expressed with the genitive case.

Feminine noun Landschaft in genitive singular → der Landschaft

Compare:

Die Landschaft ist schön. – The landscape is beautiful. (nominative)
Der Rest der Landschaft ist schön. – The rest of the landscape is beautiful. (genitive after “Rest”)

Why is the verb “riecht” followed by “nach”? Can’t you just say “riecht Gras”?

The verb riechen (to smell) normally needs a preposition to say what something smells like.

riechen nach + dative = to smell of / to smell like

So:

Die Landschaft riecht nach Gras.
= The landscape smells of grass.

You can’t say “Die Landschaft riecht Gras” to mean that the landscape smells like grass. That would sound more like “the landscape smells grass” (as if the landscape had a nose).

Other common patterns:

an etwas riechen – to sniff something / to smell something closely
- Ich rieche an der Blume. – I sniff the flower.

Here, we need “nach” because we’re describing what the landscape smells like.

Which case do “Gras, Heu und frischer Luft” take after “nach”, and how do you know?

The preposition nach always takes the dative case when it means “after” or “of/like (smell)”.

So in:

riecht nach Gras, Heu und frischer Luft

all three nouns are in the dative singular:

Gras – neuter dative singular (same form as nominative)
Heu – neuter dative singular (same form as nominative)
frischer Luft – feminine dative singular (this is where you see the change)

You know it’s dative because:

nach + dative is a fixed pattern
there is no other reason in the sentence for another case (no direct object, etc.)

Why is it “frischer Luft” and not “frische Luft”?

This is adjective declension in the dative feminine.

We have:

Preposition nach → needs dative
Noun Luft – feminine
No article (no der, eine, etc.)
Adjective frisch- in front of the noun

In this situation (feminine, singular, dative, no article), the adjective takes the strong ending:

Feminine dative singular strong ending: -er

So:

(Nom.) frische Luft – fresh air (e.g. Frische Luft ist gut.)
(Dat.) nach frischer Luft – of fresh air (lit. smells after fresh air)

If you added an article, you’d see the same case in a more familiar form:

nach der frischen Luft – also dative feminine.

So “frisch → frischer” because of dative feminine strong declension.

Why don’t “Gras” and “Heu” change form like “Luft” does?

Two reasons:

Gender and case endings
- Gras and Heu are neuter nouns.
- In modern German, neuter dative singular usually looks the same as the nominative (das Gras, das Heu → nach Gras, nach Heu).
- Luft is feminine, and we see the dative feminine only in the article/adjective ending: frischer Luft.
No article or adjective with Gras and Heu
- There’s nothing in front of Gras and Heu that needs to show a case ending.
- With Luft, the case appears on the adjective: frischer.

So all three are dative, but you only visibly notice it on “frischer Luft”.

Why is there no article before “Gras, Heu und frischer Luft”?

In both German and English, we often omit the article with uncountable / mass nouns when speaking in a general sense.

English:

It smells of grass, hay and fresh air. (no “the” or “a”)

German:

Es riecht nach Gras, Heu und frischer Luft.

If you add an article, the meaning becomes more specific:

Es riecht nach dem Gras, dem Heu und der frischen Luft vom Bauernhof.
= It smells of the grass, the hay and the fresh air from the farm. (very specific)

Here, the sentence describes a general smell, so no article is natural.

Could I say “Der Rest von der Landschaft riecht nach …” instead of “Der Rest der Landschaft …”?

You can say:

Der Rest von der Landschaft riecht nach Gras, Heu und frischer Luft.

This is grammatically possible and understandable, but:

“Der Rest der Landschaft” (with the genitive) sounds more natural and more standard in written and formal German.
“von der”
- dative is common in spoken / informal language, and much more so with certain nouns (e.g. der Freund von meiner Schwester).

For “Rest”, the genitive is very common:

Der Rest des Kuchens – the rest of the cake
Der Rest des Tages – the rest of the day
Der Rest der Landschaft – the rest of the landscape

So for good written style, prefer the genitive: “Der Rest der Landschaft”.

Can I change the word order, for example: “Nach Gras, Heu und frischer Luft riecht der Rest der Landschaft”?

Yes. German word order is relatively flexible as long as the conjugated verb stays in second position in a main clause.

Original:

Der Rest der Landschaft riecht nach Gras, Heu und frischer Luft.

You can put the “nach …” phrase first for emphasis:

Nach Gras, Heu und frischer Luft riecht der Rest der Landschaft.

Meaning is the same, but:

The second version emphasizes the smell itself (“As for the smell – of grass, hay and fresh air – that’s what the rest of the landscape has”).

Both are correct, natural German.

What’s the difference between “riechen nach”, “riechen wie”, “duften”, and “stinken”?

They all relate to smell, but with different nuances:

riechen nach + dative
- Neutral; just says what something smells like.
- Die Landschaft riecht nach Gras. – The landscape smells of grass.
riechen wie + noun
- Literally “to smell like”. Used less often and can sound a bit more colloquial/comparative.
- Es riecht wie Gras. – It smells like grass. (often interchangeable with riecht nach Gras)
duften (nach + dative)
- Has a positive nuance: to smell good, to be fragrant.
- Die Wiese duftet nach Blumen. – The meadow smells pleasantly of flowers.
stinken (nach + dative)
- Has a negative nuance: to stink, to smell bad.
- Der Müll stinkt nach faulen Eiern. – The trash stinks of rotten eggs.

In your sentence, “riecht nach” is neutral: it simply describes the smell, without saying if it is good or bad (though Gras, Heu und frische Luft are usually positive!).