Practice some of the vocabulary from this song and its dative prepositions using these flashcards, games and exercises.

Did you miss the analysis for this song? Find it here!

Activities

Vocabulary Excercises

We have chosen 20 terms out of this song’s lyrics to form our vocabulary list, which can be found below. You can use the following activities to learn and practice this vocabulary.

Vocabulary Flashcards – Learn the vocabulary from this song with our sets of German to English and English to German flashcards, then test yourself with our interactive flashcards.

Vocabulary Games – Practice the vocabulary for this song using our memory and matching games and our word search puzzle.

Vocabulary Exercises – Fill in the missing vocabulary with drag and drop and fill in the blanks exercises.

Grammar Exercises

There are several prepositions that are followed by the dative case in this song. These prepositions and a refresher of the dative case can be found below. You can use the following activities to learn and practice these prepositions. Please note, we have not included instances where the dative is not different from the nominative, such as where the preposition is directly followed by a noun or an adjective.

Dative Preposition Flashcards – Practice the dative prepositions in this song with our sets of German to English and English to German flashcards, then test yourself with our interactive flashcards.

Dative Preposition Games – Practice the dative prepositions in this song using our memory and matching games.

Dative Preposition Exercises – Practice the dative prepositions in this song using our drag and drop, fill in, and highlighting exercises.

Resources

Vocabulary List

Term	Meaning	P of S	Context
bekämpfen	to fight, combat, control	reg verb	Bekämpfe
Berg (pl Berge)	hill, mountain; heap, pile, mass	masc noun	Berge
Boden (pl Böden)	ground, floor, soil, land	masc noun	Boden
Dach (pl Dächer)	roof	neut noun	Dach
genießen	to enjoy; eat, drink	irreg verb	genießen
Haupstache (pl Hauptsachen)	main thing, main point	fem noun	Hauptsache
hintreiben	to drive s.o./sth to a certain place, cause s.o. to go somewhere	irreg verb	hintreibt,
Hölle (pl Höllen)	hell	fem noun	Hölle
lachen	to laugh	reg verb	lache
morgens	in the morning	adv	morgens
schenken	to gift, give as present	reg verb	schenk’
sterben	to die	irreg verb	sterbe
Strand (pl Strände)	beach, shore, bank	masc noun	Strand
teilen	to divide, split; share	reg verb	teile
verlieren	to lose, misplace; forfeit	irreg verb	verlier’
verpassen	to miss, miss out on	reg verb	Verprass’
weg	far away, far off; gone	adv	weg
weinen	to cry	reg verb	wein’
zeigen	to point; show, indicate	reg verb	zeig’
zweifeln	to doubt	reg verb	zweifelst

Prepositions with the dative case

Preposition	Meaning	Following Case
mit	with, at, including	triggers dat
bei	near, by; for; at; in; on; with; during; among; despite	triggers dat
nach	after, past; behind; to, towards; according to; by the authority of, following; like; for	triggers dat
an	on, at, in; by, near; with; during	triggers dat or acc*
von	from; off; of, by	triggers dat
zu	to, towards; at, on, by, in	triggers dat
von	from; off; of, by	triggers dat

*Some prepositions can take either the accusative or the dative case, depending on the use. For these:
– Use the dative for locations and static positions
– Use the accusative for direction, movement, and changes in position

Dative Case

The dative case is used for the indirect object of a phrase. It also follows certain prepositions. The tables below show the declensions of the definite articles, indefinite articles and personal pronouns in the dative case.

Definite Articles

Case	Masculine	Feminine	Neuter	Plural	Meaning
Nominative	der	die	das	die	the
Dative	dem	der	dem	den	to the

Contractions

When combined with certain prepositions, some dative definite articles form contractions. We see one example of this in this song. The dative masculine and neuter forms following the preposition ‘an’ (‘an dem’) contract to form ‘am’. Examples seen in this song are ‘am Ende’, ‘am Boden’ and ‘am Strand’. The dative form ‘am’ is also used before the superlative form of adjectives, such as seen in this song in ‘am besten’ and ‘am liebsten’.

Indefinite Articles

Case	Masculine	Feminine	Neuter	Plural	Meaning
Nominative	ein	eine	ein	none	a/an
Dative	einem	einer	einem	none	to a/an

Personal Pronouns

Nominative	Dative	Meaning
ich	mir	to or for me
du	dir	to or for you
er	ihm	to or for him
sie	ihr	to or for her
es	ihm	to or for it
wir	uns	to or for us
ihr	euch	to or for you
sie	ihnen	to or for them
Sie	Ihnen	to or for you

A Note on ‘Hause’…

In this song we see the phrases ‘nach Hause’ and ‘zu Hause’, which mean ‘towards home’ and ‘at home’, respectively. The additional ‘e’ at the end of ‘Haus’ is due to a now largely archaic rule where an ‘-e’ ending was added to certain masc and neuter nouns in the dative case. It survives today almost exclusively in set phrases such as here in ‘zu Hause’, ‘im Zuge’ meaning ‘in the course of’, and ‘am Tage’ meaning ‘during the day’. It will also be seen occasionally in formal prose, poetry, and song lyrics.