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Chapter 9 of 16 · Explore the Norwegian path

Words · Chapter 9 of 16

The words a fable is made of

Sixteen naming words for the cast and the scenery, eight describing words, and five small words that place everything. Enough to furnish nearly every scene in your first book.

≈ 4 min of reading · Practise at your own pace

What’s in this chapter
  • Sixteen naming words — the cast and the scenery — furnish nearly every scene in the first book.
  • Eight describing words cover the rest, and sit in front of the noun as in English.
  • A describing word adds -t in front of an et word and -e once the thing is definite.
  • Five small words place everything.

Sixteen naming words for the cast and the scenery

A naming word names a person, an animal, a place or a thing. These sixteen furnish nearly every scene in your first book.

en hunden huun“a dog” · en fuglen fuul“a bird”
en reven rayv“a fox” · en musen muus“a mouse” · en bjørnen byurn“a bear”
en kaninen kah-NEEN“a rabbit” · en ulven uulv“a wolf” · en sauen sa-uu“a sheep”
en skogen skoog“a forest” · et treet tray“a tree” · et huset huus“a house”
en veien vay“a road” · en solen sool“a sun” · en vinden vin“a wind”
en dagen dahg“a day” · en vennen ven“a friend”

Put the endings on and they are what a story prints: revenRAY-ven“the fox”.

Eight describing words, and five small words that place everything

A describing word says what something is like. The five below it say where something is, and none of them changes anything that follows.

storstoor“big” · litenLEE-ten“small” · gammelGAM-mel“old” · nynew“new”
godgoo“good” · gladglah“happy” · tristtrist“sad” · snillsnil“kind”
iee“in” · påpaw“on” · tiltil“to” · frafrah“from” · medmay“with”

Nothing changes behind the five placing words — no endings, no extra pieces: i skogenee SKOO-gen“in the forest”. Norwegian says på where English sometimes says “in”, so take each phrase whole.

One describing word changes its ending

A describing word takes a small ending from the thing it describes. Follow each row across to see which ending goes where.

en stor hunden stoor huun“a big dog”
et stort huset stoort huus“a big house”
In front of an et word it adds -t.
et stort hus
det store husetday STOO-ruh HUU-suh“the big house”
Once the thing is “the”, a small word joins in front and the describing word takes -e. Read past both.
litenLEE-ten“small”
et lite treet LEE-tuh tray“a small tree” · småsmaw“small — plural”
“Small” is the one that changes its whole body. Learn its shapes as separate words.

Point at something with this or that

These words pick out one particular thing. The naming word keeps its “the” ending underneath them, so peel that off as usual.

Englishan en thingan et thing
thisdenne revenDEN-nuh RAY-ven“this fox”dette treetDET-tuh TRAY-uh“this tree”
denne — this — for an en thing · Estimated A1
thatden revenden RAY-ven“that fox”det treetday TRAY-uh“that tree”

“These” is disseDIS-suh. “That” is the same den and det as in det store huset — “the big house” or “that big house”, the story decides.

Read the phrase, then say what it pictures

  1. den gamle ulven

    A definite thing, so -e — and “old” loses a letter as it takes it.

    Show answer +
    den gamle ulvenden GAM-luh UUL-ven“the old wolf”
  2. et stort tre i skogen
    Show answer +
    et stort tre i skogenet stoort tray ee SKOO-gen“a big tree in the forest”
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