Revision:Prepositions (German)

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Prepositions

Prepositions are words which relate one noun (or pronoun) to another, in time or space, such as "before" (school starts before 9am), "with" (I went to the cinema with him), "by" (the house was destroyed by the earthquake), "over" (he went over the bridge), "after" (July comes after June), and so on. Prepositions in German are always followed by nouns in a certain case (accusative, dative or genitive), and this case depends on the preposition itself and the sense in which it is used. It is highly recommended to learn which case(s) each preposition takes when you are learning the word (e.g. mit is always followed by dative). Below is a list of common prepositions which take each of the various cases.

Many verbs also take prepositions, such as in English: to think of/about, to strive for, to chase after, to talk about. As in English, the verbs often have very different meanings if you change the prepositions, especially with common verbs (cf. "go for it!" and "go after it!"). Unfortunately, the prepositions often do not match up with the English prepositions (e.g. "to smell of" = riechen nach + dative; "to think of" = denken an + accusative). These, and the cases they take, must be learnt separately with the verb.

Prepositions taking the accusative

• bis
• durch
• entlang
  (N.B. entlang comes after the noun it refers to: er läuft die Straße entlang.)
• für
• gegen
• ohne
• um

Prepositions taking the dative

• aus
• außer
• bei
• entgegen
  (N.B. entgegen comes after the noun it refers to: er steht mir entgegen.)
• gegenüber
  (N.B. gegenüber can come before or after the noun it refers to.)
• mit
• nach
• seit
• von
• zu

Prepositions taking the genitive

• anstatt
• außerhalb
• innerhalb
• statt
• trotz
• während
• wegen
  (N.B. wegen can also take the dative, but this is colloquial and not used throughout Germany.)

Prepositions taking either the accusative or the dative

Prepositions which take accusative or dative often have subtly different meanings depending on their case. For example, in means "in" when followed by the dative, but "into" when followed by the accusative. Similar distinctions are made for the other prepositions, although not all have equivalent distinctions in English. The rule is: when the sentence implies motion from one place to another (e.g. "I climbed into the box"), the preposition takes the accusative; otherwise (e.g. "I was sitting in the box"), it takes the dative. To make the distinction clearer, note the difference between ich fahre in der Stadt ("I am driving [e.g. around] in town") and ich fahre in die Stadt ("I am driving into town").

• an
• auf
• hinter
• in
• neben
• über
• unter
• vor
• zwischen

Examples:

• Ich habe mich hinter dem Baum gesteckt. (no motion)
• Ich bin hinter den Baum gegangen. (motion from elsewhere to "behind the tree")
• Er stand unter der Brücke. (no motion)
• Er lief unter die Brücke. (motion from elsewhere to "under the bridge")
• Das Poster steht an der Wand. (no motion)
• Ich habe das Poster an die Wand gestellt. (motion from "off the wall" to "on the wall")