Word
Der Hund wartet vor dem Haus.
Meaning
The dog is waiting in front of the house.
Part of speech
sentence
Pronunciation
Course
Lesson
Breakdown of Der Hund wartet vor dem Haus.
dem
the; (masculine or neuter, dative)
das Haus
the house
der Hund
the dog
warten
to wait
Questions & Answers about Der Hund wartet vor dem Haus.
Why is it Der Hund and not Den Hund or Dem Hund?
Der Hund is the subject of the sentence – the one doing the action (waiting).
In German, subjects take the nominative case.
- der Hund = nominative (subject)
- den Hund = accusative (direct object)
- dem Hund = dative (indirect object)
In this sentence, the dog is not an object of any verb or preposition; he is the one who waits.
So the correct form is Der Hund (nominative).
Why does the verb look like wartet and not warte or warten?
The verb warten (to wait) is conjugated according to the subject.
Present tense of warten:
- ich warte – I wait
- du wartest – you (singular informal) wait
- er / sie / es wartet – he / she / it waits
- wir warten – we wait
- ihr wartet – you (plural informal) wait
- sie / Sie warten – they / you (formal) wait
The subject here is der Hund (3rd person singular), so we use wartet:
- Der Hund wartet … = The dog waits / is waiting …
The English translation is The dog is waiting…. Why doesn’t German use a special form like “is waiting”?