Adjective Endings
- Explain why attributive adjectives take endings while predicate adjectives do not
- Apply the weak, mixed, and strong adjective-ending patterns after different articles
- Describe art and beauty accurately using correctly declined adjectives
When adjectives take endings — and when they don’t
A German adjective takes an ending only when it stands before a noun (attributive). After the verb sein (predicate position), it stays in its bare form: Das Bild ist schön (“The picture is beautiful”) — no ending. But move it in front of the noun and it must agree: Das ist ein schönes Bild (“That is a beautiful picture”). The ending encodes the noun’s gender, case, and number*, and it depends on what article (if any) comes before the adjective. This is the single most drilled grammar point in the course.
The three patterns: weak, mixed, strong
Which endings you use depends on how much information the article already carries. Weak endings follow a definite article (der, die, das, diese…), which already shows the case, so the adjective just adds -e or -en: der schöne Garten (“the beautiful garden”). Mixed endings follow ein-words (ein, kein, mein…), which sometimes lack an ending themselves, so the adjective must fill the gap: ein schöner Garten (“a beautiful garden”). Strong endings appear when there is no article at all, so the adjective itself must carry the full case signal: schöner Wein (“good/beautiful wine”).
A practical shortcut
You do not have to memorize a huge grid all at once. Start with the weak pattern (after der-words), which is the simplest: in the nominative singular the ending is -e (for all three genders: der alte Mann, die alte Frau, das alte Haus), and it becomes -en almost everywhere else — in the accusative masculine, in the dative, in the genitive, and throughout the plural. Master that “-e in the five nominative/accusative-neuter/feminine slots, -en elsewhere” rule first, then layer on the mixed and strong patterns.
Add the correct ending: “Ich bewundere den ____ Malerei” is wrong — first fix the article/noun, then decline “modern” in “Ich bewundere die ____ Malerei” (“I admire the modern painting”; die Malerei is feminine).
- 1.Identify gender, number, case: “Malerei” is feminine singular; it is the direct object of “bewundere,” so it is accusative.
- 2.Choose the article: feminine accusative definite article is “die.”
- 3.Because a der-word (die) precedes the adjective, use the weak pattern.
- 4.In the feminine accusative, the weak ending is -e, so “modern” becomes “moderne.”
Two quick anchors for the weak pattern: adjective endings are only ever -e or -en, and -en is the “default” — if you are unsure and the phrase is plural, dative, or genitive, -en is almost always right. Reserve -e for the nominative singular (and the neuter/feminine accusative singular).
Which sentence has the correct adjective ending?
On free-response tasks, do not avoid adjectives to dodge the endings — descriptive adjectives raise your score for range and precision. Even a few correctly declined phrases (das berühmte Werk, “the famous work”; eine tiefe Emotion, “a deep emotion”) demonstrate control that graders reward.
Why does the adjective in “Das Kunstwerk ist wunderschön” have no ending, while in “ein wunderschönes Kunstwerk” it does?
Answer the 2 checkpoints as you read.
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