Lesson 19: Article-words: dieser, jeder, welcher, mancher, solcher

Vocabulary: My day (morning)

Completing this lesson will add to your overall progress:

VocabularyA1+3%A2+2%B1+0.5%
GrammarA1+1%A2+4%B1+0.9%

How to work with this lesson

  1. Read the rule — get the logic (5 minutes)
  2. Translate the exercises in writing — check against the key
  3. Say it out loud — slowly, consciously, analyzing every ending
  4. Speed up — drill the matrix until it flies out on autopilot

You passed the "Knight" test. You own der/die/das in every case. Now focus: there's a whole family of words that behave exactly like der/die/das. Learn one pattern — get five words for free.


Part 1: What article-words are (der-Wörter)

In English you say "this house", "every day", "which film?". The words "this", "every", "which" sit before a noun and point at it — like an article.

German calls these der-Wörter (article-words). Here they are:

WordEnglish
dieserthis
jedereach, every
welcherwhich? what?
manchersome, many a
solchersuch, that kind of

Five words — one declension rule.


Part 2: The main hack — "der with a prefix glued on"

dies-ER, dies-E, dies-ES = d-ER, d-IE, d-AS. Same endings!

Forget memorizing a new table. You already know how der/die/das declines. Just stick a prefix in front — dies-, jed-, welch-, manch-, solch- — and you're done.

der Mann → dieser Mann die Frau → diese Frau das Kind → dieses Kind

See? The ending -er, -e, -es is the same as the definite article der, die, das, just without the d.


Part 3: Full declension table

Masculine (der)Neuter (das)Feminine (die)Plural (die)
Nominativedieserdiesesdiesediese
Accusativediesendiesesdiesediese
Dativediesemdiesemdieserdiesen

Three things to lock in:

  1. All der-Wörter decline identically. Learn dieser — you know jeder, welcher, mancher, solcher.
  2. The endings = the definite article endings. -er, -e, -es, -en, -em — you already know them.
  3. jeder has no plural. Logical — "each" is about one thing. For the plural use alle (all).

Trap! Don't confuse der-Wörter with ein-Wörter (mein, dein, kein). With ein-Wörter, the masculine Nominative has a zero ending: mein Mann (not meiner). With der-Wörter, the ending is always there: dieser Mann. Compare: Dieser Kaffee ist gut. — Mein Kaffee ist gut. Feel the difference?


Part 4: Each word in context

WordExampleEnglish
dieserDieser Wecker ist zu lautThis alarm clock is too loud
jederJeder Morgen beginnt gleichEvery morning starts the same
welcherWelchen Tee trinkst du?Which tea do you drink?
mancherMancher Tag ist schwerMany a day is tough
solcherSolches Wetter mag ich nichtI don't like such weather

The endings shift by case and gender. Welchen Tee — Akk, m. Solches Wetter — Nom, n. Same logic as der/den/dem.

Cognate alert: welcher ≈ "which" (same root!). solcher ≈ "such". jeder echoes English "each". Four out of five have English cousins.


Next up: Lesson 20 — Separable-prefix verbs. You already met aufstehen — the prefix auf- ran to the end of the sentence. Why? And which other prefixes do that? Time to find out. (Spoiler: English does this too with phrasal verbs — "stand UP", "pick UP", "take OUT". You already know the logic.)

Lesson 19: Article-words: dieser, jeder, welcher, mancher, solcher · Deutsch · Glottos Matrix