Germans decry influence of English as ‘idiot’s apostrophe’ gets official approval - eviltoast
  • federal reverse@feddit.orgM
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    2 months ago

    What? That’s completely untrue! Any time, the word ends on an s sound, the apostrophe moves to [the end of the word].

    Matthias’s car (or alternatively, Matthias’ car) is Matthias’ Auto.

    Assuming the final e is not pronounced, Alice’s car becomes Alice’ Auto. Alternatively, it can be Alices Auto if the final e is pronounced.

    • Ephera@lemmy.ml
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      2 months ago

      Interestingly, the Duden also spits out Matthias' as possible genitive: https://www.duden.de/deklination/substantive/Matthias_Vorname
      But I was then unsure, if they had already integrated the Deppenapostroph-rule.

      I wouldn’t know having seen an apostrophe in genitive in a formal text before, but no idea. Maybe there’s regional differences. Would explain why Duden lists both.


      Original German comment:

      Interessanterweise hat der Duden auch Matthias' als möglichen Genitiv ausgespuckt: https://www.duden.de/deklination/substantive/Matthias_Vorname
      Aber ich war mir dann unsicher, ob die schon direkt die Deppenapostroph-Regel aufgenommen hatten.

      Ich wüsste nicht, dass ich schonmal einen Apostroph beim Genitiv in einem formalen Text gesehen hätte, aber ja, kein Plan. Vielleicht gibt’s da auch regionale Unterschiede. Würde erklären, warum der Duden beides listet…

      • federal reverse@feddit.orgM
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        2 months ago

        (Ftr: This is an English-language community.)

        But Duden listing Matthias as a possible genitive is wild. It seems they just list it in a weird way, because Jeremia is certainly not a reasonable genitive of Jeremia:

        duden.de: Jeremia | genitive: Jeremia, Jeremias