Word
Vi har måttet ignorere fejlen for at blive færdige.
Meaning
We have had to ignore the mistake in order to finish.
Part of speech
sentence
Pronunciation
Course
Breakdown of Vi har måttet ignorere fejlen for at blive færdige.
vi
we
have
to have
blive
to stay / to become
måtte
to be allowed to / must
Questions & Answers about Vi har måttet ignorere fejlen for at blive færdige.
How does the verb structure har måttet ignorere work in this sentence?
This is the compound perfect tense of a modal verb. We use the helping verb har, plus the past participle of the modal (måttet), followed by the bare infinitive of the main verb (ignorere). Notice that ignorere does not take an at (to) before it, because it is governed by the modal verb, exactly like in the present or past tense.
Why is it spelled måttet here instead of just måtte?
måtte is the simple past tense ("had to"), while måttet with the extra 't' is the past participle. Because we are forming a perfect tense using the helping verb har ("have had to"), we must use the past participle måttet. This one-letter difference is a very common spelling pitfall!
Could we drop the for and just say at blive færdige?
No, because the phrase expresses an intention or purpose. Whenever the English "to [verb]" can be translated as "in order to [verb]", you must use for at in Danish. If you only used at, the sentence would fail to express the "why" behind ignoring the mistake.
Why does færdige have an -e on the end if it directly follows the infinitive blive?