A Danish and Dano-Norwegian Grammar/Order of the Words
THE ORDER OF THE WORDS IN THE SENTENCE.
245. In a sentence consisting only of subject and predicate the former is placed before the latter; Manden kommer the man comes; if the position is inverted, then the sentence assumes an interrogative meaning: Kommer Manden? does the man come? If the predicate has an object the order of the words is as follows: subj.–pred.–obj.; Hesten bar Rytteren the horse carried the rider. The indirect object is placed before the direct object: Fader gav Johan Bogen father gave John the book; in interrogative sentences only the position of subj. and predicate is inverted: Gav Fader Johan Bogen? did father give J. the book. An adjective as attribute is placed before the noun: en stor Hund, den store Hund a big dog, the big dog; so also a genitive before the noun governing it: Mandens Hus the man’s house; Ciceros Taler the speeches of Cicero. An adverb determining an adjective or other adverb is placed before the word which it determines, but an adverb determining a verb is placed after it: en meget smuk Mand a very handsome man; Karl gik meget hurtigt Charles walked very fast.
Note. The personal pronouns and the demonstrative plural de having retained their objective form (mig, dig, etc.) may in dependent function exchange position with the subject without causing ambiguity: Ham saa jeg him I saw; hende gav jeg mine bedste Tanker to her I gave my best thoughts. When it is desired to emphasize any certain part of the sentence it may be given the first place in the sentence; in that case the subject always follows after the predicate: Johan gav han en Bog og Marie en nydelig Dukke he gave Johnny a book, but Mary a beautiful doll.
246. Interrogative and relative words (pronouns, adverbs and particles) and all conjunctions always take the first place. In interrogative sentences the predicate always precedes the subject, if the latter is not itself the interrogative word: hvad har du der? What have you got there? if the predicate is a compound form of the verb the subject is placed immediately after the auxiliary: hvor har du været? Where have you been.
In relative sentences the subject follows immediately after the relative word, if this latter is not itself subject: det Hus, som du har kjöbt er meget daarligt the house, which you have bought is very poor. Overalt, hvor han har været, har han gjort sig forhadt wherever he has been he has made himself disliked.
After conjunctions the words as a rule follow in the ordinary succession: naar jeg kommer til Byen skal jeg kjöbe mig nye Klæder when I go to town I shall buy myself a new suit of clothes.
Note 1. The inverted position of interrogative sentences is sometimes used in conditional propositions when the conjunction is omitted: kommer jeg til Byen, skal jeg hilse din Moder fra dig or hvis jeg kommer til Byen, skal etc. if I come to town I shall bring your mother your greetings.
Note 2. Antiquated and chiefly used in official and commercial correspondence is the custom of inverting the subject and predicate after og and; Ex. denne Feiltagelse var meget uheldig, og formener Departementet, at den burde have været undgaaet this error was very unpleasant and the Department believes that it ought to have been avoided.