Breakdown of Hemma sover hunden på soffan.
hunden
the dog
sova
to sleep
hemma
at home
på
on / at / for (wait for) / in (believe in)
Questions & Answers about Hemma sover hunden på soffan.
Why is it sover hunden (sleeps the dog) instead of hunden sover (the dog sleeps)?
This is because of the V2 rule in Swedish. The verb (in this case, sover) must almost always be the second block of information in a sentence. Because we started the sentence with the location Hemma (At home), the verb must come next, pushing the subject hunden (the dog) to the third spot.
Why use Hemma instead of just Hem?
In Swedish, hemma is used when someone or something is already resting at a location, just like the dog sleeping at home here. You use hem when you are showing movement toward a destination, such as walking home (går hem).
How does the word soffan mean "the sofa"?
Unlike English, which puts "the" as a separate word in front, Swedish adds an ending to the noun to make it definite. The basic word for a sofa is en soffa. Because it already ends in a vowel, we just add -n to the end to get soffan (the sofa). You can see a similar rule with hunden (the dog), where -en is added to hund.
Does sover change if there are multiple dogs sleeping?