Contents

The following Help Topics are available:

Overview of Danish

Alphabet

Nouns

Gender and Agreement

Number and Agreement

Pronouns

Articles

Adjectives

Adverbs

Verbs

Verb Inflection

Prepositions

Conjunctions

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Overview of
 Overview of Danish

Welcome and congratulations on your choice to learn Danish!  This Grammar Basics help file will serve as your introduction to the most basic aspects of Danish grammar.  This overview will give you some more information about this exciting language.

Danish is one of the Scandinavian languages and is closely related to Norwegian and Swedish.  Danish is spoken by approximately five million people, those in Denmark as well as in Greenland and the Faroe Islands. As Danish is so closely related to Norwegian and Swedish, it is possible to understand spoken and written forms of these other two languages once you learn Danish  spend some time with Danish and then try Norwegian or Swedish!!


 Alphabet

A	a

B	b

C	c

D	d

E	e

F	f

G	g

H	h

I	i

J	j

K	k

L	l

M	m

N	n

O	o

P	p

R	r

S	s

T	t

U	u

V	v

W	w

X	x

Y	y

Z	z

Æ	æ

Ø	ø

Å	å


Nouns

A noun is a word that names a person, place, thing or idea.

Kirsten  (Kirsten)

Kobenhavn  (Copenhagen)

enkeltværelse  (single room)

In Danish, nouns decline.  The form of a noun will change to express its grammatical function.  This change in form depends on whether a noun is:

Common or Neuter  (Gender)

Definite or Indefinite

Singular or Plural  (Number)

Common Gender Nouns:  dreng (boy)

Singular Indefinite	Singular Definite

en dreng (a boy)	drengen (the boy)

Neuter Nouns:  hus (house)

Singular Indefinite	Singular Definite

et hus (a house)	huset (the house)

There are also two cases of nouns in Danish:  Basic and Genitive.

The Nominative Case denotes the noun is being used as the subject. There are no special endings to express the Nominative Case.

The Genitive Case expresses possession.  The Genitive Case adds an "s" to the nominative form.  (Note:  if the nominative form already ends in a "s", then an apostrophe represents the genitive.

Min kjole og min mands jakkesæt skal presses.

(My dress and my husband's suit need to be pressed.)

See Also:

Gender and Agreement

Number and Agreement

Articles


Gender and Agreement

The gender of a Danish noun, pronoun, adjective and article can be common, or neuter.

klokken  (the clock; common gender)

jakkesæt  (suit, neuter gender)

The majority of Danish nouns are common gender.

Neuter nouns are usually:  words for many substances (such as paper or water), areas and localities, letters of the alphabet, words expressing idea nouns (such as ego or  a no), collectives, or nouns derived from adjectives.  As a Danish language learner, it may help you to learn the gender of each new noun.

Pronouns, adjectives and articles generally agree with a noun's gender. Having learned the gender of a noun, one can easily use the appropriate pronoun, adjective or article.

See also:

Nouns

Adjectives

Articles

Pronouns


Number
Number and Agreement

There are two numbers in Danish:  singular and plural.

The plural form in Danish has three declensions:

Those ending in -er

Those ending in -e

Those with no ending

There are many guidelines which determine which way a plural noun would decline; however, its easier just to learn the plural declension along with the noun and its gender.

See Also

Nouns

Pronouns

Adjectives

Articles

Verbs


Pronouns

A pronoun is a word that stands for a previously mentioned (or understood) noun.

The house was badly damaged when it was hit by the hurricane.

The pronoun it refers back to the noun house.

Pronouns can be used in various ways:  as the subject of a verb, as the object of a verb, or they can refer back to the subject (reflexive).  There are also possessive pronouns.

Singular	Subject Pronouns	Object Pronouns	Reflexive Pronouns	Possessive Pronouns

1st person	jeg (I)	mig (me)	mig (myself)	min/mit/mine (my, mine)

2nd person informal	du (you)	dig (you)	dig (yourself)	din/dit/dine (your, yours)

2nd person formal	De (you)	Dem (you)	Dem (yourself)	Deres (your, yours)

3rd person-masculine	han (he)	ham (him)	sig (himself)	hans/sin (his)

3rd person-feminine	hun (she)	hende (her)	sig (herself)	hendes/sin (her)

3rd person-common	den (it)	den (it)	sig (itself)	dens/sin (its)

3rd person-neuter	det (it)	det (it)	sig (itself)	dets/sin (its)

Plural

1st person	vi (we)	os (us)	os (ourselves)	vores (our, ours)

2nd person informal	I (you)	jer (you)	jer (yourselves)	jeres (your, yours)

2nd person formal	De (you)	Dem (you)	Dem (yourselves)	Deres (your, yours)

3rd person	de (they)	dem (them)	sig (themselves)	deres (their, theirs)


Articles

Danish uses two types of articles:  definite and indefinite.

Articles agree in gender and number with the nouns they modify.

The indefinite article (a, an) is written before the noun, as in English.  Common nouns take the indefinite article -en, while neuter nouns take the indefinite article -et.

Goddag, har De et enkeltværelse?

Good morning, do you have a single room?

The definite article (the) is attached to the end of the noun. Common nouns take the definite article -(e)n, while neuter nouns take the definite article -(e)t.

Hvor meget koster billetten?

How much is the ticket?

See Also:

Nouns

Gender and Agreement

Number and Agreement

Adjectives


Adjectives

An adjective agrees in gender and number with the noun or pronoun it modifies.  In Danish, adjectives are inflected.

In the indefinite form of the adjective, there is no ending for the singular common gender, while the singular neuter gender adds -t.

In the definite form of an adjective (singular and plural) and the indefinite plural form, add -e.

fin (fine)

Common	Neuter

Sing. Indef.	en fin	et fint

Sing. Def.	den fine	det fine

Pl. Indef.	fine	fine

Pl. Def	de fine	de fine

See Also:

Gender and Agreement

Number and Agreement

Articles


Adverbs

Many adverbs are formed from adjectives.  In Danish, adverbs are usually formed by adding -t to the adjective in the common gender singular form.

See Also:

Adjectives


Verb Conjugations:  Tense and Mood
Verbs

A verb expresses action or a state of being.

In the dictionary, you will find a verb listed in the infinitive form.  The infinitive is the basic form of the verb without inflection.  Sometimes the infinitive may be preceded by at, this is equivalent to the English to.

at møde  (to meet)

The infinitive can be inflected to show mood and tense.

MOODS

Imperative:  expresses a command.

Indicative:  expresses objective statements and questions.

Subjunctive:  expresses a wish or request.  (The subjunctive in Danish is rarely used, except in certain idioms.)

Imperative

To form the imperative, drop the e from infinitives ending in -e.

For infinitives not ending in e, use the same form as the infinitive.

Indicative

The indicative mood has a variety of tenses.

Present Tense:  Expresses something happening presently.  There are also instances in Danish where the present is used differently than in the English.

Past Tense:  Used to express an action or event completed in the past.

Perfect Tense:  Formed with the verb, have or to be  and a past participle.  It expresses an action or event that occurred in the past, without a fixed time to it.

Past Perfect Tense:  Formed with the past tense of the verb, to have or to be and a past participle.  It expresses an action or event that preceded another event in the past.

Future Tense:  Expresses an event that will happen.

Future Perfect Tense:  Expresses an action or event in the future that will end by the time another event occurs.

Future of the Past Tense:  Expresses an action or event in the future with a point of reference in the past.

Future Perfect of the Past Tense:  Expresses something that should have been done but wasnt.

Subjunctive

The subjunctive is primarily used with certain expressions.  It is virtually identical to the infinitive.  Verb stems ending in vowels do not change their endings, while those ending in consonants add -e.

See Also:

Verb Inflection


Verb Inflection

Inflection is a change in the form of a verb to show grammatical function.  A verb is inflected when it is changed from the infinitive to the imperative, participles or any of the indicative tenses.

Verb Stems

A verb stem is the part of the verb to which endings are added.  Danish has two verbs stems, those ending in consonants and those ending in vowels.

Modal Auxiliary Verbs

Unlike English, Danish modal verbs have 4 main forms:  infinitive, present, past, and past participle.  The past and infinitive are the same and the past participle adds

-t to the infinitive

Infinitive	Present	Past	Past participle
burde (ought to)	bør	burde	burdet
kunne (be able to)	kan	kunnte	kunntet
måtte (must)	må	måtte	måttet
skulle (should)	skal	skulle	skullet
turde(dare)	tør	turde	turdet
ville (will)	vil	ville	villet

Imperative

To form the imperative, drop the e from infinitives ending in -e.

For infinitives not ending in e, use the same form as the infinitive.

Indicative

Present Tense:

To form the present tense add an -r to the infinitive.  Verb stems ending in

 -i, -u, and -y add -er.  The present tense in Danish does not distinguish by person or number.

Some verbs are irregular:

Past Tense:

There is also no distinction made in person or number in the past tense.  However, there are four different groups of verb endings.

GROUP ONE  consists of verb stems ending in vowels.  The ending after the vowel will be ede.

GROUP TWO consists of verb stems ending in consonants.  The ending after the consonant will be -te.

GROUP THREE consists of a small group of verbs and ends in de.

GROUP FOUR consists of strong verbs.  These are verbs that have a monosyllabic past tense form.  They either end in t or have no ending at all.

Past Participle

The past participle ending for Groups one and four and modal verbs have the ending et.

The past participle ending for Groups two and three have the ending t.

Present Participle

The present participle is formed by adding ende to the stem.

Perfect Tense: The perfect tense is formed with the verb, have or være  and a past participle.

Transitive verbs and intransitive verbs not expressing motion, as well as the verbs have and være use the auxiliary verb, have.

Past Perfect Tense:   The past perfect is formed with the past tense of have (havde) or the past tense of være (nåede) and a past participle.

The rules for when havde and nåede are used is the same as for the perfect tense.

Future Tense:  The future is formed by using vil  or skal plus the infinitive.

Future Perfect Tense:  This tense is formed by using vil have or vil være plus the infinitive.

Future of the Past Tense:  This tense is formed by using ville plus the infinitive.

Future Perfect of the Past Tense: This tense is formed by using ville have or ville være plus the infinitive.

Subjunctive

The subjunctive is primarily used with certain expressions.  It is virtually identical to the infinitive.  Verb stems ending in vowels do not change their endings, while those ending in consonants add -e.


Prepositions

Prepositions are the connecting words that show the relationships between words in the sentence.  Nouns, pronouns, noun phrases, gerunds, or noun clauses can be the complement of the prepositions.

Some prepositions in Danish include the following:

af	by, out of

efter	after, following

for	for

i	in

med	with

mod	against, toward

om	around

over	over

på	at, in, on top of

til	to (a specific place)

under	below

ved	at, by


Conjunctions

Conjunctions join words, phrases and clauses together.

The most commonly used conjunction in Danish is og (and).

Drej til højre ved lyset, og gå to gader hen.

Turn right at the light and walk two blocks.

Other commonly used conjunctions include:

eller (or)

men (but)

for (for)

så (so)