Introduction to Nynorsk/Nouns

As you might have guessed from the previous page, Nynorsk has three grammatical genders. The indefinite articles are as follows; and have no exceptions:

They are used in the same way as the English indefinite articles:
 * ein båt ("a boat")
 * ei liste ("a list")
 * eit bord ("a table")

Unlike English, Norwegian uses suffixes as definite articles. The singular suffixes are

For all the suffixes, whether indicating indefinite or definite, plural or singular, they replace any ending vowel, or are otherwise simply appended. Thus we have
 * båten ("the boat")
 * lista ("the list")
 * bordet ("the table")

The plural definite suffixes are not quite as unique as the singular definite suffixes, and they will therefore be introduced with the individual noun classes below.

Masculine nouns
There is one main class of masculine nouns, here referred to as m1. Its inflection goes as follows:

Note that the definite singular form of the masculine noun hage ("garden") is hagen; since, as noted above, any ending vowel is replaced by the definite suffix.

Most masculine nouns follow the pattern in the table above, but there is another sizeable class, m2:

As you see, this class can be inflected just as the first class. Traditionally, however, it has been inflected with -er and -ene in plural. This is the pattern that was used in Old Norwegian, and is still found in many dialects.

The word mann, meaning "man" (as in "male human"), has a unique inflection of its own, following a pattern similar to its English relative:

The word son ("son") has a highly irregular inflection:

The word sko ("shoe") also has a special inflection:

skor and skorne are the traditional forms.

Feminine nouns
Traditionally, there have been at least three major classes of feminine nouns; and in many dialects, there still are. With the latest standard reform (2012), however, one might say that Nynorsk only has two classes left, depending on definition. There is still a difference between the two (f1 and f2) in the singular indefinite form, however, so it does not hurt to keep treating them as two separate classes, as is done below:

As you can see, the last class, f3, has the same plural suffixes as the main masculine class, m1; while f1 and f2 both have the same plural suffixes as the traditional inflection of m2. The definite singular suffixes, however, are distinct for each grammatical gender.

Just like the word son, the word dotter ("daughter") has an irregular inflection:

Neuter nouns
Most neuter nouns follow the inflection pattern below:

As you can see, both indefinite forms are identical for this class. The words auga ("eye") and øyra ("ear") are inflected the following way:

In other words, both nouns can be inflected just as a regular neuter noun. As with the previous similar cases, the traditional forms are the ones that stand out: øyra - øyra - øyro - øyro.

Examples
Try to figure out the meaning of the following sentences by using the tables above (and whatever you have learnt from the previous pages). The answer is accessed by hovering the mouse pointer over the sentence.


 * 1) Ser du bjørnen?
 * 2) Her er skorne dine. (her = here)
 * 3) Han gav dei eit døme.
 * 4) Ho fekk nye meldingar. (nye = new (pl.))