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Summarizing the diminutives

B1Nouns And Articles · lesson 23 of 29

If you only arrived on this page to look up a diminutive ending for a noun, have a look at the [checklist](#/lesson/NounsAndArticles.21) and ignore the table below.

Now for the really, really serious students:

-je

Nouns ending in: | Operation

basic form | Simply add -je

-tje

Nouns ending in: | Operation

vowel (a, e, i, o, u, y) or -w | Single -a, -o, and -u are doubled to keep vowel long (see also [rules for keeping vowels short/long](#/lesson/SpellingAndPronunciation.21)).

Note that i is never doubled to keep the vowel long. Instead an e is added: -i --> -ietje

Single e is a [mute e](#/lesson/SpellingAndPronunciation.17) and does not need to be doubled; you only add -tje.

Single y gets an apostrophe to [keep vowel long](#/lesson/SpellingAndPronunciation.20).

All others (vowel combinations, double ee): Simply add -tje.

[long vowel](#/lesson/SpellingAndPronunciation.09) \+ -r, -l, or -n | Simply add -tje.

unstressed -er, -el, -en, or -or | Simply add -tje.

-etje

Nouns ending in: | Operation

[short vowel](#/lesson/SpellingAndPronunciation.13) \+ -r, -l, -n, -m or -ng | Single -r, -l, -n, and -m are doubled to keep vowel short (see also [rules for keeping vowels short/long](#/lesson/SpellingAndPronunciation.21))

-kje

Nouns ending in: | Operation

unstressed -ing | Replace -g by -k

-pje

Nouns ending in: | Operation

[Long vowel](#/lesson/SpellingAndPronunciation.03) + _m_ | Simply add -pje.

unstressed -um or -em | Simply add -pje.

-lm or -rm | Simply add -pje.

Irregular diminutives Compound nouns
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