Adjectives: Declension & Comparative

Hallo: I think I may be confused about adjectival endings in the comparative. I believe that one uses the "er" ending for an adjective used with the indefinite article and a masculine nominative noun, e.g. ein kleiner Garten, a beautiful garden. Does one add ___another ___"er" when saying a more beautiful garden, i.e. ein kleinerer Garten, also in nominative with indefinite article? Many thanks for the help. Regards, Caroline

Well, now my englisch is getting peculiar too. I meant a "small/smaller" garten, not a beautiful one. Sorry for the confusion! Regards, Caroline

Hi Caroline, yes, you are right. If you say "a little garden" you say: "ein kleiner Garten" and for "a smaller garden" you say: "ein kleinerer Garten". The superlative would be "der kleinste Garten" - "the smallest garden" Here are some more examples: "ein kleiner Tisch" - a little table "ein kleinerer Tisch" - a smaller table "ein grosser Hund" - a big dog "ein grösserer Hund" - a bigger dog I hope that helps :D

Many thanks! Regards, Caroline

Oh dear I am now very confused! Wish I was a clever as you Caroline!! - what on earth is a superlative!!?? I am now doing Adjectives and finding it impossible!! Any chance of another super-idots guide Nathalie??!! Thanks. Dale

Yes, this is confusing. We say in English - good (which is the positive form of the adjective); better (which is the comparative form); and__ the ____best__ (which is the superlative form). Or - confusing, more confusing, and the most confusing! Good luck with the adjectives! Caroline

Hi there, comparative and superlatiev are actually quite easy, so nothing to worry about :D When you are talking about one thing it's "good". When you are comparing it to something else, it's "better" and when you say that it is better than anything else than it's "the best". That's the concept behind comparative and superlative. There is also a clue in the name: comparative because you compare something. The superlative either puts things at the top or botto of the class. The general rule in German is that the comparative is formed by adding the ending -er to the basic form of the word, often together with an umlaut. For example: Gross - big grösser - bigger Of course there are exceptions. The superlative can be formed in two ways. First you can add the ending -ste to the basic form of the word. If the word ends with "s" or "ß" you only need to add -te. You also place an article in front of the word, just like in English. The second way of building the superlative is by adding the ending -ten and the word "am" instead of an article: "Paul ist der grösste" "Paul ist am grössten" Please have a look at grammar chapter 3.1 and 3.2 for more examples or ask me again on the forum. Does that make it a bit clearer? :D

Oh NOOOO!!!! How can this happen? Nathalie!!!! I prepared a quite long message concerning this issue and when I finished all :cry: I pressed the "Preview" button to check and then submit it and I found myself logged out and needed to relogin :!: :!: And I lost everything I wrote :cry: How could this happen! :cry: And now :?: :?: :?: :?: NOOOOO :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry:

This made me really upset now! :evil: Because it was a long message and I don´t think I will be that patient to retype it from the beginning! :cry: