zijn
Pronunciation: /zɛi̯n/
“zijn” is a Dutch word. Its 12 meanings in English:
verb
- to be, to exist
- Used to connect a noun to an adjective that describes it.
- Used to form the perfect tense of the active voice of some verbs, together with a past participle.
- Note: The perfect tense of most other verbs is formed using hebben.
- Used to form the perfect tense of the passive voice, together with a past participle.
- Note: The imperfect tense passive is formed using worden.
- Used to form the continuous forms of various tenses, together with aan het or, in archaic style, with a present participle.
- to go, to go on a trip and return
- Used to indicate weather, temperature or some other general condition.
- to be, to equal, to total, to amount to; used to indicate that the values on either side of an equation are the same.
determiner
Etymology
From Middle Dutch sijn, from Old Dutch sīn. The infinitive zijn along with the words is and zij (present indicative and subjunctive) derive ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *h₁es- (“to be”), which had no separate infinitive in Germanic. The modern infinitive was probably back-formed in late Old Dutch from the first-person plural subjunctive sīn (“we be”), since this form had become identical…
Keep exploring: in the interactive dictionary every word of a definition is a link. Open “zijn” there
More Dutch words
- zijl
- zijlie
- zijlieden
- zijlui
- zijn biezen pakken
- zijn broek verslijten
- zijn duivels ontbinden
- zijn eigen boontjes doppen
About this dictionary
The Dutch dictionary on Glottosphere has 55,948 entries with a page. Browse the Dutch dictionary.
Definitions are from Wiktionary, extracted by Kaikki.org, and are available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.