Copyright: Grammar ®1995-96 Translation Experts


table of contents

 Danish Grammar Reference Help Contents

©1995-1996 Translation Experts Ltd. All Rights Reserved.

Verbs

Articles & Nouns

Adjectives

Adverbs

Pronouns

Prepositions

Conjunctions

Time & Numbers

Sentence Structure

Correspondence

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 Verbs

Key Verbs

Basic Form & Present Tense

Past Tense

Irregular Verbs

Auxilliary Verbs

Passive Verbs

Verbs Ending in S

Verbs Used in Other Ways


Key Verbs

English	Danish
to be	at være
I am	jeg er
you are (familiar singular)	du er
you are (polite singular)	De er
he is	ham er
she  is	hun er
it is (common gender)	den er
it is (neuter gender)	det er
we are	vi er
you are (familiar plural)	I er
you are (polite plural)	De er
they are	de er
English	Danish
to have	at have
I have	jeg har
you have (familiar sing.)	du har
you have (polite sing.)	De har
he has	han har
she has	hun har
it has (common gender)	den har
it has (neuter gender)	det har
we have	vi har
you have (familiar plural)	I har
you have (polite plural)	De har
they have	de har


basic form of verbs

Basic Form & Present Tense

Danish verbs do not change with the person (e.g. I hear = jeg horer and he hears = han horer). The majority of Danish infinitive verbs end with either an unstressed e or s stressed vowel. In both cases, the present tense is formed by the adding r, for example:

English	Danish
Infinitive	Infinitive	Present Tense
to speak	at tale	taler
to eat	at spise	spiser
to run	at lobe	lober
to use	at bruge	bruger
to see	at se	ser
to sew	at sy	sy(e)r

The present tense for a few verbs is formed differently:

English	Danish
Infinitive	Infinitive	Present Tense
to do	at gore	gor
to know	at vide	ved

Danish does not have the English -ing form, -ing is expressed in exactly the same manner as the simple present.


Past Tense

In Danish, some verbs are regular, which means that there is no change of the stem vowel. With the irregular Danish verbs, there is a change. Like English, Danish has a simple past tense (e.g. "spoke") as well as perfect (e.g. "have spoken") and pluperfect tenses (e.g. "had spoken"). These are formed in a very similar manner to the English tenses. The perfect and the pluperfect tenses are made up of a past participle ("spoken") and the appropriate tense of have, for example:

	Infinite	Present	Past	Perfect	Pluperfect
English	have	have	had	have had	had   had
Danish	have	har	havde	har haft	havde haft
English	be	am	was	have been	had been
Danish	være	er	var	har været	havde været

In the majority of regular verbs, to make the simple past tense you add ede to the stem of the verb. If the infinitive of the verb has a double consonant before the final e, the past tense will retain the double consonant. To make the past participle, add et to the stem of the verb and retain the double consonant of the infinitive if it has one, for example:

	Infinitive	Past	Perfect
English	to kiss	kissed	have kissed
Danish	at kysse	kyssede	har  kysset
English	to cough	coughed	have coughed
Danish	at hoste	hostede	har  hostet

A much smaller group of verbs adds te to the stem to form the past tense and t to form the past participle, for example:

	Infinitive	Past	Perfect
English	to eat	eaten	have eaten
Danish	at spise	spiste	har  spist


Irregular Verbs

English	Infinitive	Past	Perfect
ask	sporge	spugte	har spurgt
ask/pray	bede	bad	har bedt
bring	bringe	bragte	har bragt
come/put	komme	kom	har/er kommet
count	tælle	talte	har talt
do	gore	gjorde	har gjort
follow	folge	fulgte	har fulgt
get	få	fik	har fået
give	give	gav	har givet
grease/butter	smore	smurte	har smurt
lay	lægge	lagde	har lagt
lie	ligge	lå	har ligget
put/set	sætte	satte	har sat
say	sige	sagde	har sagt
see/look	se	så	har set
sell	sælge	solgte	har solgt
smoke	ryge	rog	har roget
sit	sidde	sad	har siddet
stay/become	blive	blev	er  blevet
take	tage	tog	har taget
walk/leave	gå	gik	har/er gået


Auxilliary Verbs

Shall, can, and will, belong to the key group of verbs which are indispensable for use in conjunction with other verbs such as can, may, will, shall, must, ought, and dare.

In Danish like in English, these verbs have no command form, but unlike their English counterparts (with the exception of dare) they have an infinitive.

English	Infinitive	Present
can/is able to	at kunne	kan
shall/is to/must	at skulle	skal
will/wants to	at ville	vil
may/must	at måtte	må
ought to	at burde	bor
dare(s)	at turde	tor


Passive Verbs

When one does something, the verb is said to be "active". When something is done to one or to something, the verb is said to be "passive". In Danish, the passive is created in one of two ways:

either an s replaces the final r of the present tense or is added to the end of the past tense:

Active	Active	Pasive	Passive
English	Danish	English	Danish
to treat	at behandle	to be treated	at behandles
we treat	vi behadler	we are treated	vi behandles
I treated	jeg behandlede	I was treated	jed behandledes


verbs ending in s

Verbs Ending in -s

A few Danish verbs occur in the passive s form only, these include:

English	Danish
agree	enes
fail	mislykkes
long (for)	længes (efter)
succeed	lykkes

Some verbs can have a sense of "each other" when used with the passive s:

English	Danish
they see each other often	de ses ofte
see you! (we will see each other)	vi ses!
they meet (each other)	de modes
the boys are fighting (each other)	drengene slås
they are quarrelling (with each other)	de skændes

Some verbs can have a special meaning with the passive s:

English	Danish
there are	der findes
it seems	det synes
I think I am of the opinion that	jeg synes
do you like	synes du om


Verbs Used in Other Ways

Just as in English, verbs can become adjectives in two ways. The past participle is often used as an adjective:

English	Danish
a cleaned floor	et renset gulv
a newly built farm	en nybygget gård
the painted face	det malede ansigt
all whitewashed houses	adle hvidkalkede huse

In English, an -ing form of the verb is often used to form an adjective or adverb. Danish has an equivalent: add -nde to the verb infinitive (or -ende if the infinitive ends with a stressed vowel):

English	Danish
the bleeding heart	det blodende hjerte
She is a rising (coming) star	Hun er en kommende stjerne.
the existing rule	den eksisterende regel
on my writing days	på mine skrivende dage
Is that a hardworking assistant?	Er det en hårdtarbejdende assistent?

Adjectives formed from verbs can also act as nouns, in which case they take the separate difinitive article den, det or de rather than the definitive ending:

English	Danish
The travellers stopped.	De rejsede standsede.
The visitors walked very quietly.	De besogende gik meget stille.
Traveller' luggage must be handed over.	Resendes bagage skal afleveres.
The visitors entrance is to the right.	Besogendes indgang er til hojre.


nouns

 Nouns & Articles

Nouns are words, which refer to persons, animals, things or abstract ideas.

Nouns & Articles

Plural Nouns


articles and nouns

Nouns & Articles

In Danish, nouns can be of either common (en) or neuter (et) gender. In Danish, most beings and their occupations will use the common en but other than this there is no hard and fast rule by which you can determine the gender of a noun. In the definitive (a) form, en and et precede the noun -- as in a house (et hus) or a dog (en hund). In the definitive (the) form, they are added to the end of the word: the house (huset) or the dog (hunden), for example:

	Danish		English
	(a form)	(the form)
(common gender)	en hund	hunden	dog
	en mand	maden	man
(neuter gender)	et hus	huset	house
	et træ	træt	tree

If the noun ends with an unstressed e the definitive form only adds the n or the t:

(common gender)	en kvinde	kvinden	woman
(neuter gender)	et tæppe	tæppet	carpet

Nouns which end with a stressed e (they have one syllable only or have an accent on the e to show stress) take the full ending:

(common gender)	en ske	skeen	spoon
	en kafé	kaféen	café

In nouns which end with a stressed vowel followed by a single consonant the consonant is often doubled before the usual ending is added.

(common gender)	en kop	koppen	cup
	en stak	stakken	stack
(neuter gender)	et kys	kysset	kiss


plural of nouns

Plural Nouns

In both English and Danish the plural is sometimes formed by simply changing a vowel of the stem word (English: man/men; Danish mand/mænd). The majority of Danish nouns add er for the indefinitive plural, or, if they already end in unstressed e, just r. In the definitive form, they add a further ne, for example:

	"a" Form	Indefinitive Plural	Definitive Plural
English	a flower	flowers	these flowers
Danish	en blomst	blomster	blomsterne
English	a garden	gardens	these gardens
Danish	en have	haver	haverne


 Adjectives

Adjective Endings

Comparison of Adjectives


Adjective Endings

In Danish, adjectives change with the gender of the noun as well as tihe -- its definitive (the) or indefinitive (a) and plural forms.

The "basic" form of a Danish adjective is used unchaged in connection with nouns of common gender, singular, in their indefinitive form (a):

English	Danish
a sweet cake	en sod kage
a good woman	en god kvinde
a large Welshman	en stor wailser
an amusing anecdote	en morsom anekdote
a blue car	en blå bil

When adjectives ar used to describe a singular neuter noun they usually require the addition of a t:

English	Danish
a sweet smile	et sodt smil
a good heart	et godt hjerte
a large meal	et stort måltid
an amusing fairy tale	et morsomt eventyr
a blue curtain	et blåt gardin

In the indefinitive, plural most Danish adjectives end with an e:

English	Danish
sweet things	sode sager
good deeds	gode gerninger
great events	store begvenheder

When an adjective is placed before a noun in the definite (the) form, the definite ending is not added to the noun. Instead, the adjective is preceded by another word meaning the which is the same as the words for it and they: den for common gender singular, det for neuter singular and de dor for plural. The ending on the adjective, though, is the same for these --  e.

English	Danish
the sweet pain	den sode smerte
the large meal	det store måltid
the lovely experiences	de dejlige oplevelser


Comparison of Adjectives

Danish comparative adjectives are not far from English: good, better, best = god, bedre, bedst. In short, the comparative ending er in English = (e)er in Danish and the superlative est in English = (e)st in Danish.

The superlative form adds an e in the indefinitive plural and in all definitive forms (den sodeste sang = the sweetest song or de sodeste sange = the sweetest songs.

English	Danish	Comparative	Superlative
soft	blod	blodere	blodest
espensive	dyr	dyrere	dyrest
rich	rig	rigere	rigest
wise	klog	klogere	klogest
high	hoj	hojere	hojest
low	lav	lavere	lavest
wide	bred	bredere	bredest

Consonant doubling examples:

		Comparative	Superlative
narrow	smal	smallere	smallest
smart	flot	flottere	flottest
beautiful	smuk	smukkere	smukkest
stupid	dum	dummere	dummest

Adjectives that end in -ig (but not -rig) or -som add only -st in the superlative:

		Comparative	Superlative
lovely	dejlig	dejligere	dejligst
cheap	bilig	biligere	biligst
poor	fattig	fattigere	fatigst
happy	lykkelig	lykkeligere	lykkeligst
slow	langsom	langsommere	langsomst

If an adjective ends with -el, -en or -er, one should normally drop the e before adding the ere or est endings. In words containing a double consonant, one consonant is dropped in the process:

		Comparative	Superlative
noble	ædel	ædlere	ædlest
lazy	doven	dovnere	dovnest
cheerful	munter	muntere	muntrest
delicious	lækker	lækrere	lækrest


 Adverbs

Common Adverbs

Adverbs of Place & Movement


Common Adverbs

Adverbs modify verbs, adjectives or other adverbs to which they are added. In Danish, adverbs are constructed from adjectives by adding t (e.g. godt = well, langst = far), vis (e.g. heldigvis = fortunately). Sometimes adjectives are used unchanged as adverbs (e.g. let = lightly).

Some common Danish adverbs include:

English	Danish	English	Danish
never	aldrig	especially	især
all the same/ anyway	alligevel	far	langt
always	altid	(for a) long (time)	længe
only	bare/blot/kun	perhaps	muligvis
then	da	perhaps	måske
besides/ furthermore	desunden	of course	naturligvis
unfortunately	desværre	now	nu
yet/however	dog	almost	næsten
otherwise	ellers	often	ofte/tit
still/yet	endnu	also	også
too	for	of course	selvfolgelig
quite/rather	ganske	sometimes	sommetider
willingly	gerne	immediately	straks
fortunately	heldig is	then	så
not	ikke	occasionally	undertiden


adverbs of place and movement

Adverbs of Place & Movement

	Danish
English	Movement	Place
went away	gik bort	----
was away/gone	var borte	----
went/walked home	gik hjem	----
stayed at home	blev hjemme	----
walk forward	gå frem	----
we have got there	vi er fremme	----
come in!	komm ind!	----
we are locked in	vi er likket inde	----
out you go	ud med dig	----
we are out	vi er ude	----
up(wards)	op	oppe
over/past	over	ovre
over to	hen	henne


 Pronouns

Pronouns are words which can substitute for nouns.

Object Pronouns

Reflexive Pronouns

Relative Pronouns


Object Pronouns

English	Danish
me	mig
you (familiar sing.)	dig
you (polite sing.)	Dem
him	ham
her	hende
it	den/det
us	os
you (familiar pl.)	jer
you (polite pl.)	Dem
them	dem


Reflexive Pronouns

English	Danish
myself	jeg
yourself (familiar sing.)	du
yourself (polite sing.)	De
himself/herself	han/hun
itself	den/det
ourselves	vi
yourselves (familiar pl.)	I
yourselves (familiar pl.)	De
themselves	de


Relative Pronouns

One Danish word (som) can be used for several different English ones: who, whom, that and which. In many instances, one may use der also.


 Prepositions

English	Danish	English	Danish
(moving by)/ along	ad	along	langs (med)
of	af	with	med
behind	bag/ bagved	among/ between	(i)mellem
among	(i)blandt	towards/ against	(i)mod
after	efter	near	nær(ved)
for	for	about/on	om
in front of/ before	foran	around	omkring
past	forbi	over/above	over
before	for	opposite	over for
from/off	fra	on	på
through	(i)gennem	to	til
with/at	hos	without	uden


 Conjunctions

Conjunctions link words, phrases and clauses.

English	Danish
and	og
or	eller
but	men
plus	samt
as well as	såvel som
for/because	for
so	så


time and numbers

 Time & Numbers

Days & Months

Hours of The Day

Numbers


days and months

Days & Months

 Days

English	Danish
Monday	mandag
Tuesday	tirsdag
Wednesday	onsdag
Thursday	torsdag
Friday	fredag
Saturday	lordag
Sunday	sondag

 Months

English	Danish
January	januar
February	februar
March	marts
April	april
May	maj
June	juni
July	juli
August	august
September	september
October	oktober
November	november
December	december


Hours of The Day

The 24-hour clock is used in Denmark. The common English designations a.m./p.m. are not used in Denmark.

Time	Danish
6-9	morgen
9-12	formiddag
12	middag
noon-13	frokost/frokosttid
12-18	eftermiddag
18-24	aften
24-6	nat


Numbers

Number	Danish
0	nul
1	én/ét
2	to
3	tre
4	fire
5	fem
6	seks
7	syv
8	otte
9	ni
10	ti
11	elleve
12	tolv
13	tretten
14	fjorten
15	femten
16	seksten
17	sytten
18	atten
19	nitten
20	tyve
21	enogtyve
22	toogtyve
30	tred(i)ve
40	fyrre
50	halvtreds
60	tres
70	halvfjerds
80	firs
90	halvfems
100	(er)hundrede
101	hundrede og én/ét
113	hundrede og tretten
231	to hundrede enogtredive
8010	otte tusind og ti
100,000	(ét) hundrede tusind
2,000,000	to millioner


 Sentence Structure

Danish word order is often the same as English but there are some very important differences. In simple Danish sentences, the verb always comes second, no matter what the sentence begins with:

English	Danish
Today I am buying a car.	Jeg kober jeg en bil

When the sentence begins with a word or phrase which is not the subject, the subject will always come immediately after the verb and not before it as it does in English. This is known an inversion (i.e. the subject and verb are inverted so that the verb precedes the subject).

Straightforward questions in Danish (i.e. those formed without an interrogative or question word) are formed by inversion (the verb first, followed immediately by the subject):

English	Danish
Are you coming?	Kommer du alene?
Do you understand German?	Forstår du tysk?


letters

 Correspondence

In Danish, the date is written, for example, den 8. maj or den 25. December.

In Danish, there is no equivalent to the common English letter opening Dear Sir(s). When writing to a company, one should go straight into the text unless an indivdual is know by their title and name. When writing to someone not personally know but whose name is known, then, one should use Hr. and their title (e.g. Direktor) before their name.

To end a letter:

	English	Danish
Business	kind regards	Med venlig hilsen
	with high esteem	Med hojagtelse
Friends	loving greetings	Kærlig hilsen
	devoted	Mange venlige hils(e)ner  Deres/din hengivne