THE DANISH LANGUAGE

Danish is an old language spoken today by around 6 million people mostly in Denmark and
the northern parts of the neighbouring Germany, where it has minority language status. It is
also widely spoken in Greenland – an autonomous region of the Kingdom of Denmark.
Modern-day Danish is actually derived from Old Norse and belongs in the North Germanic
language group. It is also the language in which Hans Christian Andersen wrote his
timeless tales.

1. Due to centuries of close contact (and colonisation), Danish is such a close relative
to Norwegian and Swedish that the three languages are still largely mutually
intelligible. In fact, they are much more closely connected than various varieties of
Chinese, making them more like dialects than separate languages.

2. Much like German, Danish also allows the creation of new nouns by simply
stringing words together. These compounds can reach lengths of over 50
letters. The one example provided is the longest Danish word ever used in an
official context speciallægepraksisplanlægningsstabiliseringsperiode and it
means  „perioada planului de stabilizare pentru practica unui medic specialist”

However, this word itself was out-done by Hans Christian Andersen when he
created edebukkebensoverogundergeneralkrigskommandersergenten – a
parody of Danish military titles – meaning “the goaty-legged-above-and-
under-general-war-commanding-sergeant”.

3. Like English, Danish uses the Roman alphabet, but it contains three
extra vowels: Æ, Ø, and Å. Therefore, it has a total of nine vowels,
which can be pronounced in sixteen different ways. For instance, the
“a” in sal (hall), salt (salt), and saks (scissors) sounds distinct in
each word.
4. There’s a polite way of speaking -- but it’s rarely used nowadays.
English speakers often struggle with languages that distinguish
between informal and polite ways of saying “you”. Danish does make
this distinction, as du is informal whereas De is formal.
However, De is rarely used in modern speech and is found mostly in
old-fashioned speech or formal letters.

5. Danish features a neat phonological feature called stød, which can

sound like a small hiccup or a creak in one’s voice. This is notoriously
challenging for non-native speakers to master, but it’s important: stød
is the only difference between the pronunciation of the
 words bønner (beans) and bønder (farmer), haender(happens and
hands)
6. Nouns in Danish can take either of two genders, but they are
called common and neuter rather than masculine and feminine. The
division between these two genders is mostly arbitrary, though all
nouns must belong to one or the other.
7. As in German and Old English, Danish starts counting the number 21 from
the cardinals, resulting in numbers such as one-and-twenty or enogtyve. But
in addition to that, Danish also counts its higher numbers based on the
number 20. So, the number 60 in Danish is tres, which in older versions of
the language meant tre sinds tyve (“three times twenty”).

Where things get even more complicated, however, is with numbers that
don’t divide exactly by twenty. To say 70, you need to do some advanced
mental gymnastics because the word for that number – halvfjerds – actually
means “half-fourth-t(imes-of-twenty)”, combining not only the numbering
system based on 20 but also adding a fossilised term for “four and a half”.

8. Hygge (din daneză și norvegiană ['hygə]) este un adjectiv danez și norvegian frecvent

utilizat, ceea ce înseamnă „confortabil”, „plăcut”, „frumos”, „bun”. Hygge are chiar mai
multe conotații cum ar fi „protejat”, „intim”, „cămin confortatbil”, „dulce”, „pitoresc”,
„confort”, „mic, dar frumos”, „drăguț”. Acest adjectiv este adesea folosit în sensul de „tipic
danez”.Hygge este un concept folosit de danezi pentru a arăta modul de viață frumos.
1. When you greet someone you say “hej” (pronouncing it like in English, but a bit shorter)
and when you leave them you say “hej hej”. I recently found out that “hej” is an abbreviation
for “her er jeg” (“here am I”). Which means that when you arrive you say “here am I”, and
when you leave you say “here am I, here am I”. (?) Or sometimes people will say “I hope
you’ll have a very nice day!” and the other will answer “here am I, here am I”. Go figure.
  (I found this a quite
expressive “here am I” representation)
2. There’s an expression used to say “no problem” which is “ingen ko på isen”, meaning
“there’s no cow on the ice” – no wonder: imagine if you are a farmer and go looking after
your cow and suddenly –

3. Bo and Ib are actual names.

4.”lørdag” (saturday in Danish) derives from “laugardag”, which in old Nordic meant “bath-
day” (let us all suppose (hope?) evolution of hygiene notions around here to have no relation
to the word’s stagnation in time)
5. There’s no word for “please”! (?!?!)

6. If you do somebody a “bjørnetjeneste” (“bear favour”) it means it was a kindly meant

favour, but you actually did more harm than good. (What is this supposed to say about the
poor bears?)

7. The word “gift” means both “married” and “poison”

8. A kitchen towel is called a “whispering piece”
10.When feeling helpless or powerless in some business, instead of saying “I find myself in a
complicated situation” you can just say “I’m standing with my hair in the mailbox”.

thank you=tak

God morgen!    = Bună dimineaţa!

God dag!    = Bună ziua!
God aften!    = Bună seara!
God nat!    = Noapte bună!
På gensyn!    = La revedere!
Farvel !    = La revedere!, Cu bine!
Velkommen!    = Bun venit!

Tak!    = Mulţumesc!
Ingen årsag    = N-aveţi pentru ce
På forhånd tak    = Mulţumesc anticipat
Selv tak    = Şi eu vă mulţumesc
Måske    = Poate
På snarligt gensyn    = Pe curând
Ja    = Da
Nej    = Nu
Undskyld    = Scuzaţi
Om forladelse    = Iertaţi-mă

Det gør mig ondt    = Îmi pare rău

Ilvordan går det?    = Ce mai faceţi? Ce mai faci?

Godt nytår!    = La mulţi ani!
Lykke til!    = Mult noroc!
Det ved jeg ikke.    = Nu ştiu.
Hjælp    = Ajutor
Værsgo    = Poftiţi
Pas på    = Atenţie
Skynd Dem    = Grăbiţi-vă
Vær forsigtig    = Fiţi atent

Vær venlig    = Te rog

Beklager    = Îmi pare rău
Det forstår jeg ikke    = Nu înţeleg
Hej!    = Bună!
Kan du taler langsommere?    = Poţi vorbi mai rar?

DE CAUTAT PE PINTEREST