Dels knådar vi leran, dels formar vi den.

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Breakdown of Dels knådar vi leran, dels formar vi den.

• den: it
• leran: the clay
• knåda: to knead

Questions & Answers about Dels knådar vi leran, dels formar vi den.

What does dels ..., dels ... mean?

Dels ..., dels ... is a pairing that means something like partly ..., partly ..., on the one hand ..., on the other hand ..., or both ... and ... depending on context.

In this sentence:

Dels knådar vi leran, dels formar vi den.

the idea is:

• one part of the activity is kneading the clay
• another part is shaping it

So dels introduces one component, and the second dels introduces another.

It is not exactly the same as simple and. It organizes the sentence into two parallel parts.

Why is it knådar vi and formar vi, not vi knådar and vi formar?

This is because Swedish follows the verb-second rule in main clauses.

When dels comes first, it takes the first position in the clause. The finite verb then has to come second:

• Dels knådar vi leran
• Dels formar vi den

So the word order becomes:

1. dels
2. verb
3. subject

This is very common in Swedish whenever something other than the subject starts the sentence.

Compare:

• Vi knådar leran.
• Nu knådar vi leran.
• Dels knådar vi leran.

In all of these, the verb still stays in second position.