Grammar: Luxembourgish Eifeler Regel

This page is aiming at explaining the Luxembourgish Eifeler Regel.

The Eifeler Regel in the Luxembourgish language is mainly a pronouciation based rule that has been integrated into grammar. This means that the final 'n' or 'nn' is also dropped in written language if it is not pronounced. Whether the final 'n' or 'nn' is dropped in Luxembourgish language, depends on the word, number or character that follows. The rules are ass follows:

The final 'n' or 'nn' is not dropped:

if the next word starts with the consonants 'd', 'h', 'n', 't', 'z' (e.g.: den Hond, däin Duch, en Tuerm, den Nol, den Zuch)
if the next word starts with a vowel (e.g.: den Owend, däin Apel, en Iesel, den Eemer, den Uhu)
if the next word starts with a 'y' followed by a consonant (e.g.: den Yves, vun Ypres)
if next comes a number that, written out, starts with a vowel or the consonants 'd', 'h', 'n', 't', 'z' (e.g.: den 1., mir hunn 20 Joer gefeiert, en 100-Euro Schäin)
if the word is used alone or is located at the end of a line (e.g.: net fëmmen, Moien, Neen)
if the next word is taken from a foreign language that starts with a consonant and where pronounciation of this first letter sounds like e.g.: 'ts', 'tsch', 'dj' or a vowel (mainly for acronyms), as else the stream of speach would be hacked (e.g.: den James Bond, den SMS-Ubidder, den Check-in)
in front of any ponctuation or special character (e.g.: Neen, Du solls ophalen! Mir koumen (wéi ëmmer) ze spéit un.)
for defined exceptions (e.g.: de Mann huet, eng Studentin kann dat, et gëtt genuch Grënn fir dat Thema)
if the final 'n' or 'n' is part of a name (brand, first name, last name, countries, aso.) (e.g.: den Här Bemtgen kënnt, Spuenien kann net verléieren, den Alain Atten wéisst dat, Avon verkeeft) or a word/group of words is used as a defined name (e.g.: klickt op Alles verkafen fir … (where 'Alles verkafen' is to be seen as the defined name of a button))

If the new word without final 'n' or 'nn' can be confounded with a word that ends on 'e', the 'e' is turned into 'ë'. (e.g.: Avenuen -> Avenuë, Chancen -> Chancë, Revuen -> Revuë)

if the next word starts with a consonant, except 'd', 'h', 'n', 't', 'z' (e.g.: de Kanner, kee Su)
if the next word starts with a 'y' followed by a vowel (e.g.: de Yan, de Yogi)
if next comes a number that, written out, starts with a consonant, except for the letters 'd', 'h', 'n', 't', 'z' (e.g.: de 5., mir hu 60 Joer gefeiert, e 700-Euro Gutschäin)
if the next word is taken from a foreign language that starts with a vowel and where pronounciation of this first letter sounds like a consonant (e.g.: de One-Night-Stand, de OneNote-Fichier, de OneCare-Programm)

The final 'n' or 'nn' is dropped:

The Eifeler Regel is also applied when creating compound words and the rules above are applied all the same. (e.g.: zesummen + setzen = zesummesetzen, zwëschen + Fall = Zwëschefall , Dammen + Schong = Dammeschong)

In front of the words 'si', 'se', 'sech', 'säin', 'seng', 'sou' the final 'n' or 'nn' can also remain untouched. (e.g.: mir hunn se fonnt) In order to reduce confusion we advise to refer to the rule that says that the final 'n' or 'nn' is dropped in front of an 's' (consonant). (e.g.: mir hu se fonnt)