"Sie haben den Apfel."
Translation:They have the apple.
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Yes. In writing formal you is always capitalized, but that won't help if it is at the beginning of the sentence or spoken.
However, formal you (Sie) requires that you directly talk to someone in direct speech. Whereas they indicates that you talk about some people (behind their backs?). These cases are usually clear to distinguish by context.
I just copy from myself:
We are talking about grammatical gender here. They have very little to nothing to do with the meaning of the noun. E.g. all nouns which last syllable is -ung, -heit, -keit and -schaft are feminine. That leads to the situation that the word "Mannschaft" (team) is feminine although it only consists of the word for man and the ending. Another "rule": all nouns with -chen or -lein as last syllable are neuter. Why? That's why! There really is no logic. Do not try to find one. This essentially leaves you with the need to learn the gender with every noun, i.e. instead of just Apfel you have to memorize der Apfel.
In my opinion calling the different articles masculine, feminine and neuter raises more problems than it solves (and that is the case for French, Spanish, etc. as well), but is the established way to classify it.
Just think of it as 3 different kinds nouns the r-nouns, the e-nouns and the s-nouns. Correspondingly they have the definite articles der , die and das . Later that will help you when you have to do things like for example inflect adjectives:
Like "ein schöner Mann", "eine schöne Frau", "ein schönes Kind"
This explains it much better than I ever could:
Don't know if you're still learning German, Cass2286, but I came upon a useful post on this topic recently. If you haven't memorized every German word yet, it may come in handy.
Gender Rules (how to work out which gender)
Who knows, perhaps you'll see some patterns in some other classifications and develop your own system for making your best guess. Short of memorizing every word in the dictionary, it sounds like a good idea!
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subject is doing something to the object...when that happens der becomes den and ein becomes einen
No, it shouldn't.
1) Standard German doesn't distinguish between the simple and the progressive aspects. For this reason, a sentence like "Er geht" can be translated as either "He goes" or "He is going", depending on the context.
2) However, some English verbs change their meaning when they're used in the progressive aspect, e.g. "to have": "He has an apple" (in his cupboard) vs. "He is having an apple" (= He is eating an apple). The German verb "haben" doesn't have this second meaning: it doesn't mean "to eat". For this reason, it can't be translated using the progressive aspect in English.
1) Sie haben den Apfel. = They have the apple. OR: You [formal singular + plural] have the apple.
The formal "you" (Sie) is used to address one person or several people formally, e.g. adult stranger(s).
2.) Ihr habt den Apfel. = You [familiar plural] have the apple.
For the familiar "you", there are two words: "du" (familiar singular) and "ihr" (familiar plural; y'all). "Du" is the familiar address for one person; "ihr" is the familiar address for several people. The familiar forms are used to address e.g. close friends, family members or children. The familiar forms are also used among students and in most Internet forums.
it is just a form of Article (Der/Das/Die/Den = The) which appears according to gender+numbe+case. Nominative: Das = neuter , Der = singular+masculine , Die = singular+feminine/ Plural+All. Accusative: Den = singular+masculine :) (here, apple is a masculine word, ...but don't ask me why :P :) ). ...... *** but i don't think it means "that"
it is just a form of Article (Der/Das/Die/Den = The) which appears according to gender+numbe+case. Nominative: Das = neuter , Der = singular+masculine , Die = singular+feminine/ Plural+All...... Accusative: Den = singular+masculine :) (here, apple is a masculine word, ...but don't ask me why :P :) )
1249
Three times now I have written "They have the apple." And each time I'm told it's incorrect... That it should be "They have the apple." THAT'S WHAT I'M WRITING!