Action words for position

How to say "to put" in Dutch

You might have noticed that you often can't simply use "zijn" to describe the position of objects or persons. If you have trouble figuring out when to use liggen, staan, zitten or hangen we recommend you to read our lesson on that topic. In this article, we take it a step further and connect the right way to say "to put" or "to place" to the object's position.

Let's just go straight to some examples:

You see, there are a few ways to say "to put" and your choice depends on the position the object will have after the action.

• If the position is a "liggen"-position, you use leggen.
• If the position is a "staan"-position, you use zetten (watch out, this one looks like zitten but it is used for standing objects!).
• If the position is a "zitten"-position, you use doen or stoppen.
• If the position is a "hanging"-position, you use hangen.

You can cheat by using the word plaatsen. This can be used in almost all cases, but it does sound a bit careful and it's not the most natural way to describe a simple action.