As said before, there is a certain word order for the direct
and the indirect object.
subject
verb
object
object
Der Mann
schenkt
der Frau (indirect)
das Buch (direct).
The man
gives
the book (direct).
to the woman (indirect).
There are two things
to be noticed. First:
In German the indirect
object is before
the direct
object.
In English the direct
object is before
the indirect
object. (= meaning it's
the other way round compared to German). And second:
In German as well as in English it is quite clear which
is the direct and which is the indirect object. In English
because mostly it is used with the preposition to, in
German because the indirect object is in Dative that
has another form than the basic form. Therefore you
could change the word order wildly and still would be
clear which one is direct, the indirect object and who
is subject. Even though nobody would talk like this
- of course!
Der Frau schenkt der Mann das Buch.
To the woman gives the man the book.
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