Hun er ikke skyldig.

to be

Breakdown of Hun er ikke skyldig.

• hun: she
• ikke: not
• skyldig: guilty

Questions & Answers about Hun er ikke skyldig.

What is the grammatical role of each word in Hun er ikke skyldig?

• Hun = the subject pronoun, she
• er = the present tense of å være (to be)
• ikke = the negation word, not
• skyldig = an adjective meaning guilty

So the structure is:

subject + verb + negation + adjective

Why is er in the second position?

Because Norwegian main clauses normally follow the V2 rule: the finite verb comes in the second position.

In this sentence, the first element is Hun, so the verb er comes right after it:

Hun | er | ikke skyldig

You can see the same rule if another element comes first:

I dag er hun ikke skyldig.
Here I dag is first, so er still stays in second position.

Why does ikke come before skyldig?

In a normal Norwegian main clause, ikke usually comes after the finite verb and before the rest of the predicate.

So with å være + adjective, the usual order is:

subject + er + ikke + adjective

That is why you get:

Hun er ikke skyldig

and not:

Hun er skyldig ikke

Is skyldig an adjective, and does it change form?