zwaarder

Zwaarder is the comparative form of the Dutch adjective zwaar, meaning heavier or more heavy. It is used to compare the weight, intensity, or severity of two or more subjects, both in physical and figurative senses.

Etymology and orthography: The base adjective zwaar comes from Old Dutch and is related to German schwer and English heavy. The comparative form is zwaarder, which preserves the long vowel and inserts a 'd' before the suffix -er to maintain pronunciation. The standard superlative is het zwaarst.

Grammar and usage: Zwaarder typically appears with subjects that can bear weight or carry burden. It can describe tangible weight, such as objects or loads, and abstract weight, such as responsibility or difficulty. It is used with de-words and bare nouns alike: De doos is zwaarder dan de tas. De taak werd zwaarder naarmate de tijd verstreek.

Examples:

- Deze doos is zwaarder dan die doos.

- Het werk werd zwaarder toen de deadline naderde.

- De last op mijn schouders werd zwaarder na elk bericht.

Related forms: The superlative is het zwaarst. In contrastive forms of related adjectives, alternatives include "zwaarder" versus synonyms like "zwaarder" being the standard comparative; there is no separate feminine or neuter variant in the comparative suffix, which follows the Dutch agreement rules.

Cross-linguistic note: Dutch zwaarder corresponds to English heavier and German schwerer in meaning, though usage and idioms differ between languages. Zwaarder remains a common, neutral descriptor in everyday Dutch.