Breakdown of Jeg køber en ny skruetrækker fordi min er gammel.
jeg
I
være
to be
en
a / an (common)
købe
to buy
ny
new
gammel
old
min
my
fordi
because
skruetrækkeren
the screwdriver
Questions & Answers about Jeg køber en ny skruetrækker fordi min er gammel.
Why does Jeg køber translate to 'I am buying' instead of 'I buy'?
Danish doesn't have a separate '-ing' form (continuous tense) like English does. Depending on the context, Jeg køber translates to either 'I buy' or 'I am buying'.
Why is the adjective ny used without any ending like -t or -e?
The noun it describes, skruetrækker, is an en word (common gender) and is singular. In Danish, adjectives describing singular en words stay in their basic form, so ny doesn't get an extra ending.
The word min usually means 'my'. How does it mean 'mine' here?
In Danish, possessive words like min ('my') can stand completely on their own to mean 'mine'. We use min instead of mit here because it refers back to en skruetrækker.
Why is the word for old gammel instead of gammelt?
Just like with ny, the adjective must match the gender of the noun it describes. Because the implied noun is skruetrækker (an en word), we use the basic form gammel. You would only use gammelt if you were talking about an et word.
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