In Chapter 2 we learned how to express your nationality, and discovered that whereas English uses an adjective - i.e. "I am English" -, German uses a noun without a different article - "Ich bin Engländer" (literally: "I am Englishman").

When you wish to express "German beer" or "English food", as we have started to do in this chapter, you need the appropriate adjective to express your nationality. These are listed in the table below:

Vocabulary 4: Adjectives of nationality   Country Adjective Translation Andorra andorranisch Andorran Australien australisch Australian Belgien belgisch Belgian Brasilien brasilianisch Brazilian Bulgarien bulgarisch Bulgarian China chinesisch Chinese Dänemark dänisch Danish Deutschland deutsch German England englisch English Estland estländisch estnisch Estonian Finnland finnisch Finnish Frankreich französisch French Griechenland griechisch Greek Großbritannien britisch British Indien indisch Indian Irland irisch Irish Island isländisch Icelandic Israel israelisch Israeli Italien italienisch Italian Japan japanisch Japanese Kanada kanadisch Canadian Kolumbien kolumbianisch Columbian Kroatien kroatisch Croatian Lettland lettisch Latvian Liechtenstein liechtensteinisch Liechtensteinian  Litauen litauisch Lithuanian Luxemburg luxemburgisch Luxembourgish Mazedonien mazedonisch Macedonian Mexiko mexikanisch Mexican Moldawien moldawisch Moldovan Monaco monegassisch Monegasque Neuseeland neuseeländisch New Zealand die Niederlande niederländisch Dutch Norwegen norwegisch Norwegian Österreich österreichisch Austrian Polen polnisch Polish Portugal portugiesisch Portuguese Rumänien rumänisch Romanian Russland russisch Russian Schottland schottisch Scottish Schweden schwedisch Swedish die Schweiz schweizerisch Schweizer Swiss die Slowakei slowakisch Slovakian Slowenien slowenisch Slovenian Spanien spanisch Spanish Südafrika südafrikanisch South African Südkorea südkoreanisch South Korean die Tschechische Republik tschechisch Czech Tunesien tunesisch Tunisian die Türkei türkisch Turkish die Ukraine ukrainisch Ukranian Ungarn ungarisch Hungarian die USA (US-)amerikanisch American Wales walisisch Welsh Zypern zypriotisch Cypriot

Grammatical Points
1. Unlike English, adjectives referring to countries take a small letter in German. Thus "my German uncle" would be translated as "mein deutscher Onkel".

2. Adjectives of nationality take adjective endings in exactly the same way as other adjectives.

3. There are two different adjectives to translate "Swiss". The first of these - "schweizerisch" behaves like any other adjective of nationality. The second however "Schweizer" always starts with a capital letter and never takes adjective endings. Thus "Swiss eggs" could either be translated as "schweizerische Eier" (= with endings) or "Schweizer Eier" (= without endings).

Test yourself!
Test yourself on German adjectives of nationality by taking the following online exercises. The first of these are the Quia vocabulary-building exercises with which you are familiar. Exercises 2 and 3 are drag and drop exercises that require you to match the correct nationality with the correct flag. The fourth and fifth exercises require you to spell adjectives of nationality correctly - against the clock!

Colours
In the course of the conversations in the first few sections of this chapter, we have encountered some more German adjectives for colours to add to the ones which have already featured in earlier chapters. Here is a list of the most important ones:

Vocabulary 5: Colours black schwarz     grey grau blue blau     red rot brown braun     white weiß green grün     yellow gelb

All of these adjectives take the normal adjectival endings - i.e. "rote Äpfel", "grüne Trauben". There are however four common colours which do not take adjectival endings and thus behave like Schweizer above. These colours are:

Vocabulary 6: Colours that do not decline beige beige     orange orange pink rosa     purple lila

Such adjectives do however often take on suffixes such as "-farben" and "-farbig", both meaning "-coloured". When they do so normal adjectival endings are added - i.e. "ein lila Kleid" or "ein lilafarbenes Kleid" (a purple dress).

Test yourself on German colours!
Test your knowledge of German colour adjectives by taking these quizzes. Click on the bar below to get started.

Chapter 7.9: Adjective endings after numbers

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