a. Quiz on declension of nouns and the definite article.
Nouns presented in Lesson One were divided into the Ancient Declension and the Modern Declension. The Ancient Declension was further subdivided into Forms I-IV.
b. Noun-vocabulary from Haeckel that follows the patterns already learned.
Form I of the Ancient Declension consists of nouns that add -e to form the plural, and some of them also umlaut the vowel in the plural. The examples given by Lange were der Tisch, das Bein, and die Hand (ä). Similarly declined nouns used by Haeckel include the following:
der Begriff - concept
der Blick ("einen Blick zu werfen")
der Augenblick
der Stoff - substance, material
der Kohlenstoff - carbon
das Ding - thing (roughly equivalent to Latin res; Heidegger wrote, Was ist ein Ding?)
das Gebiet - area
das Reich
der Stern - star
der Fixstern
das Jahr, die Jahre
das Jahrhundert
der Konflikt
der Schritt
der Fortschritt
der Rückschritt
der Process (der Prozess in more recent German)
der Punkt
der Brennpunkt
das Spiel - game
das Schauspiel - play, drama
das System, des Systems, die Systeme
das Planetensystem
das Recht - justice, right
das Thier - animal
das Herrenthier - primate
das Säugethier - mammal
das Wirbethier - vertebrate
das Zottenthier
der Zweig - branch
der Primatenzweig
with modified vowel
der Anfang. die Anfänge - beginning ("im Anfang" or am Anfang: in the beginning)
der Band, die Bände - ribbon, band, bond, volume of a book.
der Verband - association.
der Zellverband
der Lauf, die Läufe (<laufen, to run) - run, race, course. ("im Laufe der Zeit" - in the course of time)
der Stamm - stem; family, tribe, race.
der Thierstamm
der Wirbelthierstamm - the tribe of vertebrates
der Stand, die Stände - status
der Gegenstand, die Gegenstände - object; topic
der Verstand - understanding, comprehension
der Menschenverstand
der Zustand - condition
der Raum, die Räume - space
der Weltraum - outer space
der Zeitraum
die Kraft, dieKräfte - energy, force, power.
die Dampfkraft - steam-power
die Lebenskraft - life-force.
die Naturkraft - force of nature.
der Zug, die Züge - pull; trait
der Bezug ("in Bezug auf")
der Hauptzug - main characteristic
der Vorzug - preference
Form II of the Ancient Declension consists of nouns whose plural and singular forms are fundamentally the same. The examples that he gave were die Mutter, die Tochter, and das Mädchen. The first two, die Mutter, die Tochter, only change insofar as they are umlauted in the plural. Some words from this declension used by Haeckel are:
der Beobachter. des Beobachters, die Beobachter
der Forscher
der Vorgänger
das Räthsel (Rätsel in more recent German)
das Welträthsel
In Form III of the Ancient Declension the plural is formed by adding -er and umlauting stem-vowel if possible. We find a few of these in Haeckel:
das Buch, die Bücher
das Haupt, die Häupter
der Mann, die Männer
das Licht, die Lichter
das Sonnenlicht
Form IV of the Ancient Declension has the plural formed by adding -en or just -n. There is an abundance of these in Haeckel.
die Form, die Formen - form.
die Frage, die Fragen - question.
die Frau also would appear to belong to this group but for some reason Lange's book gives it as an example of the Modern Declension.
Greek-derived scientific words ending in -ik all belong to this declension. Note: where English uses quasi-plural forms like politics and ethics, German and some other European languages (e.g. French) use a feminine singular form to mean the same. Thus in German die Physiken would not mean physics but different kinds of physics.
die Energetik
die Ethik - ethic (as in The Protestant Ethic), ethics.
die Kritik, die Kritiken - critique (English and German both got the word from French.)
die Mechanik - mechanics (not a mechanic, which is der Mechaniker. Likewise the names of other professionals dealing with these fields can be created by adding -er.)
die Musik
die Optik
die Politik, die Politiken - policy
die Physik
die Astrophysik
die Republik, die Republiken (It is really a Latin term, res publica, that was assimilated into this category. Accordingly publik is not a noun but an adjective in German.)
die Technik, die Techniken - technology, engineering
A special subgroup of the IVth-Form Ancient Declension consists in those foreign words ending in -ismus, which drop the -us before adding -en in the plural. These are abundant in Haeckel. They are all masculine. The meaning is usually self-evident because we have variants of these same foreign words in English.
der Absolutismus
der Anthropismus
der Dualismus
der Egoismus
der Homotheismus
der Monismus
der Organismus, die Organismen
der Elementarorganismus
der Magnetismus
der Materialismus
der Pantheismus
der Theismus
der Papismus
der Spiritualismus
The Modern Declension differs from the IVth Form of the Ancient Declension in that most of the singular forms also have -en added. Only the nominative singular form lacks it. Lange gave the examples der Graf and der Affe. (Lange also put die Frau here but it seems to belong to Form IV of the Ancient Declension.)
der Mensch, des Menschen, die Menschen - man, human, person.
der Kulturmensch
der Naturmensch
der Menschenaffe, des Menschenaffen, die Menschenaffen - anthropoid ape.
der Philosoph, des Philosophen, die Philosophen
der Naturphilosoph
der Planet, des Planeten, die Planeten
Words with the Greek suffix -ist belong to the modern declension.
der Jurist, des Juristen, die Juristen
der Protist, des Protisten, die Protisten - protozoan
c. Present active indicative conjugation of haben.
ich habe
du hast
er/sie/es hat
wir haben
ihr habt
sie haben
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