Lesson 23

Lesson 23 ~ Lesson 23

Drievoudige scheidbaarheid ~ Triple separability

There are pronominal adverbs and even a few separable verbs in Dutch that can separate into three rather than two parts. This is an area where not all dictionaries and grammarians agree, particularly where it comes to decide whether to write the components as one word or separately.

The pronominal adverb erbovenop means "on top of it", both in the literal sense of sitting on top of a haystack and in the figurative, as in following something very attentively and interactively.

Compare:

The above is the standard pattern. Compound prepositional adverbs like bovenop can be used to form pronominal adverbs just like other prepositional adverbs.

However, they cannot be used as prepositions. Instead they fall apart into a preposition (op) with a determining adverb (boven) in front of it.

Examples of triply separable pronominal adverbs that follow this basic pattern:

erbovenuit

ertegenaan

ertegenin

ertegenop

ertegenover

erdoorheen

ernaartoe

eromheen

eronderdoor

eronderuit

eropna

eropuit

eroverheen

ertussendoor

ertussenin

ertussenuit

ervanaf

ervandaan

ervandoor

ervanlangs

ervantussen

As we have seen the prepositional adverbs play a dual role in Dutch: they form both pronominal adverbs and separable verbs. This complicates matters when dealing with compound prepositional adverbs.

Take the sentence:

Hij sprong van de tafel af. - He jumped down from the table.

We could either consider af the separated adverb belonging to a separable verb afspringen, or part of a compound prepositional adverb vanaf

Hij sprong van de tafel af.

Hij sprong van de tafel af.

If we replace the noun tafel by the locative wildcard er and form a pronominal adverb, this would make a difference:

Hij sprong ervan af.

Hij sprong ervanaf

Actually even Onze Taal does not mention this particular case, but it does mention ervanaf vallen, so the second possibility is probably the right one. If that sounds iffy, then hopefully you will understand that mother tongue speakers don't always know how to look at this either. Although they would certainly agree that it is one triple word in:

"Ervanaf!" brulde hij woedend - "Get off of there!" he bellowed angrily.

There are cases here both possibilities exist, but mean something else:

Hij is ervanaf gevallen - He fell down from it (the roof e.g.)

Hij is ervan afgevallen - He lost weight from that.

The number of separable verbs with a compound prefix that can lead to triple separability is small. A good example is eruitzien. It means to look in the sense of to look good/bad/tired.

As you can see any combination is possible except *erzien

Dutch has a number of compound prepositions, such as

te midden van --- in the middle of, amid(st)

Te midden van al het lawaai bewaarde hij zijn kalmte -- Amid all the noise he kept his composure.

If such compounds contain a prepositional adverb like "van", they can also give rise to the formation of adverbial pronouns.

Te midden daarvan bewaarde hij zijn kalmte -- In the middle of that he kept his composure.