Swedish Blog

Good news! Our friends at Transparent say that the problem with uploading images and other files has been fixed! Yay! That means that I can go back to writing more interesting posts again! Sometimes, it’s hard to describe a particular feature or place without any photos – I’m sire you know what I mean, right?

But in the meantime, we still have two boring grammar topics to wrap up. So, let’s get started! The sooner we get done with them, the sooner I can show you such exciting places as the longest rope-way in the world, or the world’s largest cheese slicer.

OK, so today, we’re tackling the last installment of past participles. Yes, I know, I know, you must be sick of them by now. But like I said, it’s the LAST installment, and then we are done!!!

The one thing that we need to cover to complete this subject is the definite form of past participles. It’s not really that complicated, but I suppose it all depends on how you look at it.

I told you before that past participles behave just like adjectives. You can even say they are adjectives of sorts – verbs modified to describe nouns.

And all adjectives in Swedish have both indefinite and definite forms, even though sometimes it may look otherwise. So don’t let those adjectives trick you!!!

And don’t let those past participles trick you either, OK?

This is how it looks in practice:
Let’s say your car was filthy (mine frequently is) and you’ve just washed it.
Then you can say that you have:

• en nytvättad bil – a newly washed car

and since “bil” is an “en” noun that’s why you have “en” in front of this phrase.
This is the indefinite form.

Then let’s say you have more than one car, and only one of them is freshly washed. And you partner asks you which car you’ll be taking to visit grandma Ingrid in Uppsala, and you say that:

• den nytvättade bilen – the newly washed car

Since “bil” is an “en” noun that’s why in its definite form you have “en” (or for some nouns – “n”) attached to the end of it. And that’s why you have “den” instead of “en” opening this phrase.
This is the definite form.

Now let’s talk about houses. I’m not going to paint anything, because we’re moving soon anyway, so who cares. But you might want to paint yours this summer.
In that case you can say you will have:

• ett nymålat hus – a newly painted house

Since “hus” is an “ett” noun that’s why you have “ett” in front of this phrase.
This is the indefinite form.
But then you are driving around the neighborhood (presumably on your way to see mormor in Uppsala) and you see a house for sale that you like much better than your own. You tell your partner, as it frequently happens with partners they haven’t been paying any attention, so you have to repeat which house in the street you like:

• det nymålade huset – the newly painted house

Since “hus” is an “ett” noun that’s why in its definite form you have “et” attached to the end of it. And that’s why you have “det” instead of “ett” opening this phrase.
This is the definite form.

Something else happens with past participles that end in “t”, regardless of whether the noun they describe is “en” or “ett”.

For example:

• en nyköpt lampa – a newly bought lamp (which reminds me I need to go to IKEA and buy one!!!)

This is the indefinite form.
and

• den nyköpta lampan – the newly bought lamp

This is the definite form.

But it would be foolish to go to IKEA to buy only a lamp, and as it happens, I need a new kitchen table, too. And “bord” as we all well know is an “ett” noun, right?

• ett nyköpt bord – a newly bought table

This is the indefinite form.
and

• det nyköpta bordet – the newly bought table.

This is the definite form.

And finally, those pesky irregular past participles, which behave just like your normal garden variety adjectives.
For “en” nouns, it goes like this:

• en omskriven bok – a rewritten book (indefinite)

and

• den omskrivna boken – the rewritten book (definite)

And for “ett” nouns:

• ett omskrivet brev – a rewritten letter (indefinite)

and

• det omskrivna brevet – the rewritten letter (definite)

And I think this finally concludes our past participle session. (Yay!!!)
Next time we will cover the Swedish passive voice and then we’ll be done with grammar for a long, long while. After all, it’s almost summer (even though you couldn’t tell by the weather outside) and we need to relax and talk about fun, summer things!