DENKEN AN, but not denken auf, and also WARTEN AUF, but not warten an "Ich denke oft an dich." "Ich warte auf einen Brief." I simply don't understand and it looks like, it's not simple and beside tha

janez

DENKEN AN, but not denken auf, and also WARTEN AUF, but not warten an "Ich denke oft an dich." "Ich warte auf einen Brief." I simply don't understand and it looks like, it's not simple and beside that I'm not sure, if the prepositions in both sentences above are really correct. In both sentences we have Akkusativ, but the preposition in the first sentence is "an" and in the other "auf". Can we simply, say that only pairs "denken an" and "warten auf" are correct, but "denken auf" and "warten an" not.

Mar 30, 2015 2:06 PM

Answers · 3

Yes, only "denken an" and "warten auf" are correct. Moreover, I recommended you learn for every verb the complete pattern with the meaning, just as for English, you need to learn "to put up with s.th." etc.: an jemanden (Dat) denken auf etwas/jemanden (Akk) warten jemandem (Dat) etwas (Akk) geben sich mit etwas (Dat) abfinden You can find the patterns and their meanings e.g. on Pons (http://de.pons.com/): http://de.pons.com/%C3%BCbersetzung?q=warten&l=deen&in=&lf=de Sometimes different patterns have slightly different meanigns or nuances.

March 30, 2015

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