Language/Swedish/Grammar/When-use-Ett-or-En

INDEFINITE FORM

In Swedish we have two words to choose between when we want to write about nouns in indefinite form: En or Ett.

For example:

Ett bord = A table

En hund = A dog

Ett äpple = An apple

En skola =   A school

COMMON MISTAKE

En (Swedish article) = An (English article)

Ett (Swedish article) = A (English article)

This is not true. There is no grammatical rule to know when to use En or Ett, you just simply have to learn them.

DEFINITE FORM

When we want a noun to be in definite form we add a suffix to the noun; -en, -n or -et.

For example:

Ett bord = Bordet

En hund = Hunden

Ett äpple = Äpplet

En skola = Skolan <-- Here we just add -n since the word already ends with a vowel.

As you might have noticed, you can know which suffix to use by looking at the indefinite article.

If it's an "En-word", the suffix is -en or -n.

If it's an "Ett-word", the suffix is -et.

Authors

Brainwashme