Questions & Answers about De prøvde forgjeves.
It can mean either.
Two possibilities are:
- de = they
- De = formal you in older or very polite Norwegian
Because this word is at the beginning of the sentence, it is capitalized anyway, so the capital D does not settle the question by itself. Also, Norwegian verbs do not change form depending on the subject, so prøvde works with both they and formal you.
In modern everyday Norwegian, de meaning they is much more common. Formal De is now rare and sounds old-fashioned or very formal.
Prøvde is the past tense of å prøve.
A few useful forms are:
- infinitive: å prøve
- present: prøver
- past: prøvde
- past participle: prøvd
So this sentence describes something that happened in the past.
Because å prøve can be used without stating exactly what was tried.
In this sentence, the important idea is the unsuccessful attempt, not the specific thing they tried to do. Norwegian allows that, just like English allows They tried without adding more.
If you want to be more specific, you can add an infinitive phrase or an object, for example:
- De prøvde å åpne døren.
- De prøvde alt.