legge (to lay / put down) | Norwegian Grammar

legge ("to lay / put something down") is one half of the most important verb pair in the Norwegian placement system. It is the transitive, causative partner of ligge ("to lie"): you legge an object somewhere, and as a result that object now ligger there. Norwegian keeps this lay/lie distinction strictly — far more strictly than spoken English, which increasingly blurs the two — so getting legge right is one of the clearest markers of a learner who has understood how Norwegian thinks about position. On top of that, legge anchors a cluster of high-frequency idioms (legge seg, legge merke til, legge ut, legge ned) that every B1 learner needs.

Conjugation

Class: weak, irregular (a short Class-1-like verb with an unexpected vowel in the preterite). Auxiliary: ha.

Tense / mood	Norwegian	English
Infinitiv	å legge	to lay / put down
Presens	legger	lay(s), am/is/are laying
Preteritum	la	laid / put down
Perfektum	har lagt	have/has laid
Pluskvamperfektum	hadde lagt	had laid
Futurum	skal/vil legge	will lay
Imperativ	legg!	lay! / put it down!
Presens partisipp	leggende	laying (adjective)

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The preterite la is a homograph of the infinitivela ("to let / allow") — same spelling, two different verbs. So Han la boka på bordet = "He laid the book on the table" (preterite of legge), but La meg gå! = "Let me go!" (infinitive of la). The "let" verb conjugates la / lar / lot / har latt, so its past is lot (Han lot meg gå = "He let me go") — it never collides with legge in the past tense. The clash is only between legge's preterite and la's infinitive; context always decides, but in placement sentences la is almost always "laid."

The causative logic: legge makes things lie

The single most important idea on this page is that legge is causative. It does not describe a position — it describes the act of causing a position. You legge something (move it into a horizontal resting place), and from that moment the thing ligger (lies there). The pair works like this:

legge (transitive, takes an object): Jeg legger boka på bordet — "I lay the book on the table." Something does the laying; something gets laid.
ligge (intransitive, no object): Boka ligger på bordet — "The book lies on the table." Nothing is being acted on; the book just rests.

The mental test is simple: if there is a thing being moved into place, use legge. If something is simply resting, use ligge. This is exactly the lay/lie problem English speakers already struggle with in their own language — "Lay it down" vs "It's lying there" — so the Norwegian distinction maps directly onto a difficulty you already half-know. The difference is that Norwegian speakers never let the two collapse, so you cannot lean on the sloppy English habit of saying "I'm gonna lay down."

Jeg legger boka på bordet før jeg går.

I'm putting the book on the table before I leave.

Hun la barnet forsiktig i senga.

She laid the child gently in the bed.

Kan du legge nøklene i skuffen, er du snill?

Can you put the keys in the drawer, please?

legge seg — go to bed / lie down

Because legge is causative, you make yourself lie down with the reflexive legge seg: literally "lay oneself down." This is the everyday way to say "go to bed" or "lie down." It is the action of getting horizontal; the resulting state of being in bed is ligge (you legger deg, then you ligger there).

Jeg er helt utkjørt — jeg legger meg tidlig i kveld.

I'm exhausted — I'm going to bed early tonight.

Har du lagt deg allerede? Klokka er jo bare ti.

Have you gone to bed already? It's only ten o'clock.

Legg deg ned og hvil litt, så går hodepinen over.

Lie down and rest a bit, and the headache will pass.

Idioms with legge

legge carries a long list of fixed expressions whose meanings are not literal. Learn them as whole units:

legge merke til — to notice. Jeg la merke til at... = "I noticed that..."
legge til — to add (in speech/writing); also "to dock" (of a boat).
legge ut — to pay (cover a cost for now); also (informal) to post something online.
legge ned — to shut down, close down (a business, a school); also literally "lay down."
legge på — to hang up (a phone); also to put weight on / raise a price.
legge vekt på — to emphasise, attach importance to.

La du merke til at hun ikke sa et eneste ord?

Did you notice that she didn't say a single word?

Kan du legge ut for meg? Jeg betaler deg tilbake i morgen.

Can you cover it for me? I'll pay you back tomorrow.

De la ut bildene fra bryllupet på Instagram.

They posted the wedding photos on Instagram.

Fabrikken ble lagt ned i fjor, og to hundre mistet jobben.

The factory was shut down last year, and two hundred people lost their jobs.

Common Mistakes

❌ Jeg legger på sofaen og ser på TV.

Incorrect — legge is transitive (lay something); for your own resting position use ligge

✅ Jeg ligger på sofaen og ser på TV.

I'm lying on the sofa watching TV.

❌ Hun la seg boka på bordet.

Incorrect — 'seg' is reflexive; here you lay the book, not yourself, so no seg

✅ Hun la boka på bordet.

She laid the book on the table.

❌ Jeg har la nøklene i skuffen.

Incorrect — la is the preterite; after har use the supine lagt

✅ Jeg har lagt nøklene i skuffen.

I've put the keys in the drawer.

❌ Jeg legget barnet i senga.

Incorrect — legge does not take a regular -et preterite; it is irregular: la

✅ Jeg la barnet i senga.

I laid the child in the bed.

Key Takeaways

legge / legger / la / har lagt / legg! — weak but irregular; preterite la, supine lagt (silent g).
legge is transitive and causative: you lay an object down. Its intransitive partner is ligge (something lies).
The lay/lie split is strict in Norwegian — don't import the loose spoken-English habit of "lay down."
legge seg = go to bed / lie down; legge merke til = notice; legge ut = pay / post online; legge ned = shut down.
Watch the homograph: preterite la ("laid") looks identical to la ("let") — context decides.

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