Verbs: Past Tense

01

Regular Verbs: Four Endings

Most verbs form the past by adding an ending to the stem, which is the infinitive without its final -e. There are four endings, and every regular verb belongs to one of them.

• -et: snakke → snakket, jobbe → jobbet, vente → ventet
• -te: spise → spiste, kjøpe → kjøpte, lese → leste
• -de: prøve → prøvde, leve → levde, eie → eide
• -dde: bo → bodde, tro → trodde, skje → skjedde

The -et group is the largest, and new verbs borrowed into Norwegian join it. -dde belongs to the short verbs that end in a stressed vowel. Which of the other endings a verb takes is part of learning the verb, and dictionaries list the past form for that reason. In everyday speech, and in written Bokmål as well, the -et verbs often end in -a instead: snakka, jobba.

• Han inviterte meg til middag.

  He invited me to dinner.

• Da jeg var ung, bodde jeg i Kina.

  When I was young, I lived in China.

• Hva skjedde?

  What happened?

02

Irregular Verbs: A Change of Vowel

The strong verbs, a group of common old verbs, change the vowel inside the word instead of adding an ending. Their past forms have to be learned one by one.

• gå → gikk (went)
• se → så (saw)
• gi → ga (gave)
• ta → tok (took)
• komme → kom (came)
• skrive → skrev (wrote)
• få → fikk (got)
• si → sa (said)
• bli → ble (became)

A few more change in other ways: gjøre → gjorde, vite → visste, legge → la.

• Jeg gikk til kjøpesenteret.

  I went to the shopping mall.

• Så du det?

  Did you see it?

• Jeg ga en gave til faren min.

  I gave a present to my father.

• Jeg skrev navnet mitt på skjemaet.

  I wrote my name on the form.

03

var and hadde

The past of være is var (was, were), and the past of ha is hadde (had). Both are as frequent as their present forms.

• Hvordan var maten?

  How was the food?

• Den var deilig.

  It was delicious.

• Jeg hadde en interessant samtale i dag.

  I had an interesting conversation today.

04

When to Use the Past Tense

Norwegian uses the past tense when the time of the event is stated or clearly understood, and the event is finished. Words like i går (yesterday), i fjor (last year) and forrige uke (last week) call for it.

• I fjor begynte jeg i en ny jobb.

  Last year I started a new job.

• Forrige uke ankom jeg New York.

  Last week I arrived in New York.

• Min bestemor døde i februar.

  My grandmother died in February.

When no time is named and the event matters for the present, Norwegian prefers har with the past participle: Jeg har sett den før, "I have seen it before".