wahre

Wahre is the inflected form of the German adjective wahr, meaning true, real, or factual. It is used to describe something as correct or in accordance with reality, and it appears in various grammatical patterns depending on determiners, gender, and number.

With a definite article in singular, wahre takes the -e ending: der wahre Mann, die wahre Frau, das wahre Kind. In these cases, wahre functions as a weak-ending form of the adjective. In plural with a definite article, the ending changes to wahren: die wahren Geschichten, die wahren Ereignisse.

In contexts without a definite article or with an indefinite article, the strong endings apply: ein wahrer Mann, eine wahre Geschichte, ein wahres Kind. In the plural without an article, the form is wahre: wahre Geschichten, wahre Aussagen. The word wahre is not typically used as a standalone noun in standard German; when referring to truth as a concept, the noun Wahr- or Wahrheit is normally used.

The comparative and superlative forms follow the standard German pattern for adjectives: wahrer for the comparative (more true) and der wahrste, am wahrsten or wahrsten for the superlative. The predicative use of the adjective generally employs wahr in phrases such as “ Das ist wahr,” meaning “That is true,” rather than “das ist wahre.”

Etymology traces wahre to the Germanic word wahr, which denotes truth and reality, and is cognate with related forms in other West Germanic languages. In modern usage, wahre commonly appears in descriptive phrases and literary contexts as part of standard adjective declension.