Now we are really at a point, where it is time to apologise
to the willing student. Something that is as easy in
all the other languages as the plural can be made quite
difficult in German. Have a look at these examples:
in English
you add an s:
house =>
houses, window => windows
in Italian the a turns
into e and the o in i:
casa =>
case, libro => libri
in Persian you add ha:
ketab => ketabha,
miz=> mizha
in Spanish you add an
s:
casa => casas, libro
=> libros
etc. etc.
In most languages it is quite easy to form a plural.
In German there are no such clear rules.
The Germans were capable of creating something that even they themselves are confused about often enough. The only excuse is that the German language
is based on historical facts and not on someone's invention.
Formation of Plural in German
The German
language knows several suffixes to form
the plural: e, n, en, er, s. The most important
is the suffix e. The words that use the
s for forming the plural are quite limited
and usually they are "imported"
from other languages, mostly English. But
there are not only the different suffixes
but also the change of the vowel (or then
also the not changing vowel).
a turns
into ä
o turns
into ö
u turns
into ü
We now present the suffixes, first without the change
of the vowel, then with changes of vowel.
