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Aolecrrves
AprEcflvEs Key
y' y' y'
Com pa ratives of adjectives
points
Adjectives describing nationality are notspeltwith a capital letter in
What is a comparative adjective?
cermanexceptinpub|icorofficia|names,BUTwhentheyareusedas
A
nouns to refer to a language, they do have a capital letter' ndjectives taken from place names are formed Lly add i ng -er to the na ofthe town and never change by add i ng end i ngs to show case' place' Theycan also be used as nounsdenoting the inhabitantsofa
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comparative adjective in English is one with -eradded to itor more or less in front of it, that is used to compare people or things, for exampl e, slower, morebeautiful.
m e
ln Cerman, to say that somethingis eosier, more expensive and so on, Vou add -er to the simDle form of most adiectives.
einfach * einfacher Das war viel einfacher fiir dich.
[J
That was much easier for Vou.
ruote that adjectives whose simple form ends i n -en or -er may -e to form the comparative, as in teurer.
teuer + teurer DieseJacke ist teurgl.
>
rop the fi nal
This jacket is more expensive.
To introduce the person or th ing you are making the com parison (meaning than).
ist kleiner als seine Schwester. Diese Frage ist einfacher als die Er
with,
use als
H e is sma ller tha n h is s ister. This question is easier than the
erste. >
d
firstone.
To say that something or someone is os ... os something or someone else, you use so ... wie or genauso ... wie, ifyou want to mal<e it more emphatic. To sav
not as ... ds, you use
nicht so ... wie. gut wie ihr Bruder. Er war qenauso gli,icklich wie ich. Sie ist nicht so alt wie du. Sie ist so
She is as good as her brother He
was j ust as happy as I was
She is not as old as you
Here are some examples of commonly used adjectives which have a vowel change in the comparative form:
For
further explanation ofgrammatical terms, please
see pages x-xiv'
Adjective
Meaning
Comparative
Meaning
alt
old
elter
older
stark
strong
starker
stronger
schwach
weal(
schwAcher
weaKer
scharf
sharp
schirfer
sharper
lang
rong
lSnger
longer
KUrZ
short
shorter
warm
warm
kiirzer warmer
warmer
kalt hart
cold
kalter
colder
hard
herter
harder
groB
big
griiRer
bigger
Adjectives whose simple form ends in -el lose the -e before adding the comparative ending -er.