Naboen låner sukker af min mor.

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Breakdown of Naboen låner sukker af min mor.

• sukkeret: the sugar
• moren: the mother
• naboen: the neighbor

Questions & Answers about Naboen låner sukker af min mor.

Does låner mean “borrow” or “lend” here?

In Danish, låne covers both ideas. You know which one it is from the construction:

• Borrow: låne + thing + af + person (borrow something from someone)
• Lend: låne + person + thing or låne + thing + til + person (lend someone something / lend something to someone)

So Naboen låner sukker af min mor = The neighbor is borrowing sugar from my mother.
Lend versions would be: Min mor låner naboen sukker or Min mor låner sukker til naboen.

Why is it af and not fra?

With borrowing from a person, Danish idiomatically uses af: låne noget af nogen.

• af highlights the person as the source.
• fra is common for places, directions, and more general origin. You’ll hear låne fra in speech, and it’s fine especially with institutions (e.g., låne fra biblioteket), but with a person af is the most idiomatic choice: af min mor.

Why is there no article before sukker?