German Indefinite Pronouns: Rules and Exercises

To recognize an indefinite pronoun in German , the best and most foolproof way is certainly to learn them all by heart. There aren't that many of them, and they're also extremely useful words to know: knowing them allows you to formulate many sentences without difficulty, and to communicate what you're thinking much more easily.

In some other cases, however, it is possible to recognize indefinite pronouns in German thanks to a prefix that is used to strengthen their meaning: IRGEND.

The translation of the prefix irgend in Italian is " any ", so its only function is to make the concept of the indefinite pronoun to which it refers clearer - and even more generic.

Be careful because it cannot precede all of them: in fact, it can only be used with the indefinite pronouns einer, jemand, etwas.

Which then become:

• irgendeiner → any one
• irgendjemand → any one
• irgendetwas → anything

Very often, adjectives and indefinite pronouns are confused in German, partly because they can coincide and actually appear the same. There is, however, one difference, and it's quite obvious: while adjectives precede the noun they refer to, pronouns always come after.
Remember this, and you'll find that recognizing them will be a breeze in any German text you come across.

Let's now look at all the indefinite pronouns in German, so we can memorize them thoroughly in all their declensions. Because yes, German is an inflectional language with four cases, so it's essential to remember each ending to form meaningful sentences.

The indefinite pronouns in the nominative are:

1. Man , which translates our impersonal si ;
2. Einer , eine, eines, which corresponds to our " one ";
3. Keiner , keine, keines, which instead translates as " no one ";
4. Welcher , welche, welches, which we translate as " some, a little "
5. Mancher , manche, manches, which we translate as " some, someone or"
6. Jeder , jede, jedes, which instead translates into Italian as " everyone "
7. Jemand / Niemand , which correspond to our " someone " and " nobody "
8. Alle or Alles which instead are our " everything " and " everyone "
9. Etwas , meaning " something "

We then have some minor ones, less important but equally useful for enriching the meaning of the discussion. Among these, we point out:

• beide → "both"
• wenige → "few"
• einige → "some"
• mehrere → "several"
• viele → "many"
• einzelne → "singles"

All of these follow the declension of "alle" and "alles", depending on whether they refer to things or people