Stille is the Danish verb for putting something somewhere in an upright, standing position — a bottle on the table, a chair against the wall. But its single most useful job for a learner is an idiom that has nothing to do with standing: stille et spørgsmål, "to ask (pose) a question." English speakers almost universally reach for spørge here and produce something that sounds wrong. This page covers both the placement meaning and that crucial collocation, plus the stille / sætte / lægge trio that Danish uses where English just says "put."
Principal parts
| Infinitive | Present | Past | Past participle | Imperative |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| (at) stille | stiller | stillede | stillet | stil! |
Stille is a regular -ede weak verb — stillede / stillet. Do not confuse the verb with the identical-looking adjective/adverb stille meaning "quiet" (Vær stille! "Be quiet!"); they are homographs but unrelated in meaning.
Present tense — placement
Stille is transitive: it always takes a direct object (the thing you place) and almost always a location. The thing ends up standing.
Jeg stiller flasken på bordet.
I'll put the bottle on the table (standing up).
Vil du stille cyklen op ad muren?
Could you put the bike up against the wall?
The reflexive stille sig means to position yourself, to go and stand somewhere:
Han stiller sig altid forrest i køen.
He always positions himself at the front of the queue.
Past tense
Hun stillede tallerkenerne forsigtigt i skabet.
She carefully placed the plates in the cupboard.
Vi stillede teltet op, lige før det begyndte at regne.
We put up the tent just before it started to rain.
Present perfect
The perfect takes har + stillet.
Jeg har stillet din kuffert ind i soveværelset.
I've put your suitcase in the bedroom.
Stille et spørgsmål — pose a question
In Danish you do not "ask a question" with the verb spørge + the noun spørgsmål. The fixed collocation is stille et spørgsmål — literally "to pose/set up a question." Spørge is used on its own (spørge om noget, "to ask about something"), but the moment the noun spørgsmål appears, the verb must be stille.
Må jeg stille dig et spørgsmål?
May I ask you a question?
Journalisten stillede et svært spørgsmål til ministeren.
The journalist put a difficult question to the minister.
Eleverne stillede mange gode spørgsmål efter foredraget.
The students asked a lot of good questions after the talk.
The placement trio: stille, sætte, lægge
English uses "put" for almost any placement; Danish chooses the verb according to the resulting posture of the object. This is the same logic that governs the intransitive position verbs stå, sidde, ligge.
| Verb | Resulting position | Example object |
|---|---|---|
| stille | standing / upright | a bottle, a lamp, a vase |
| sætte | sitting / set down on a base | a cup, a child, a plant in a pot |
| lægge | lying / flat | a book, a phone, a knife |
Jeg stiller vasen på hylden, sætter koppen ved siden af og lægger bogen ovenpå.
I'll stand the vase on the shelf, set the cup beside it, and lay the book on top.
The boundary between stille and sætte is the one learners find slipperiest; for the lægge side and its notorious clash with intransitive ligge, see choosing/ligge-vs-laegge, and for sætte in full see verb-reference/saette.
Key particle verbs
| Expression | Meaning |
|---|---|
| stille op | to stand for election; to line up; to set up |
| stille op til | to take part in / agree to (e.g. an interview) |
| indstille | to adjust, set, tune (a device) |
| stille krav | to make demands |
Hun stiller op til valget næste år.
She's standing for election next year.
Kan du lige indstille temperaturen på ovnen?
Could you just set the temperature on the oven?
A dialogue
– Undskyld, må jeg stille et hurtigt spørgsmål? – Selvfølgelig, stil bare flasken her og spørg løs.
– Excuse me, may I ask a quick question? – Of course, just put the bottle here and ask away.
Common mistakes
❌ Må jeg spørge dig et spørgsmål?
Incorrect — with the noun spørgsmål the verb must be stille, not spørge.
✅ Må jeg stille dig et spørgsmål?
May I ask you a question?
❌ Jeg lægger flasken på bordet.
Wrong posture — a bottle you stand up takes stille (lægge would lay it on its side).
✅ Jeg stiller flasken på bordet.
I put the bottle on the table (upright).
❌ Vær stil!
Incorrect — the adjective 'quiet' is stille; stil! is the imperative of the verb.
✅ Vær stille!
Be quiet!
❌ Han stillede et godt spørgsmål til mig.
This is actually fine, but note: many learners wrongly write stilte — the past is stillede.
✅ Han stillede et godt spørgsmål til mig.
He asked me a good question.
❌ Hun stiller op valget.
Incorrect — 'stand for election' needs the preposition til: stille op til valget.
✅ Hun stiller op til valget.
She's standing for election.
Key takeaways
- Stille is a regular -ede verb: stiller / stillede / stillet, imperative stil!
- Its placement meaning is "put upright," and it is always transitive (stille flasken på bordet).
- The essential idiom is stille et spørgsmål — "ask a question." Never spørge et spørgsmål.
- Choose among stille (standing) / sætte (sitting) / lægge (lying) by the object's resulting posture.
- Don't confuse the verb with the adjective stille ("quiet").
Now practice Danish
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Start learning Danish→Related Topics
- Ligge vs Lægge (and Sidde/Sætte, Stå/Stille)B1 — One transitivity test solves all three Danish posture-verb pairs: if there's an object being put somewhere, use the transitive verb (lægge/sætte/stille); if something is just located there, use the intransitive verb (ligge/sidde/stå).
- SætteA2 — The verb sætte — to put, place or set (in a seated/upright position) — its reflexive sætte sig 'sit down', and the sætte/stille/lægge placement triad, with full principal parts and tenses.
- LæggeA2 — Full reference for lægge ('to lay / put down') — principal parts, all core tenses in natural sentences, the reflexive lægge sig ('lie down'), and the strict transitive/intransitive split against ligge that every English speaker has to master.
- SpørgeB1 — Full reference for spørge ('to ask a question') — principal parts with the irregular past spurgte, all core tenses in natural sentences, spørge om and spørge efter, the noun et spørgsmål, and how spørge (ask a question) differs from bede om (request a thing).