Breakdown of Kravallpolisen låter en trettio fredliga demonstranter bära sina banderoller.
en
a, an (common)
sin
his/her/its/their own (en-word)
trettio
thirty
låta
to let, allow
bära
to carry
demonstranten
the demonstrator
kravallpolisen
the riot police
fredlig
peaceful
banderollen
the banner
Questions & Answers about Kravallpolisen låter en trettio fredliga demonstranter bära sina banderoller.
Why is there a singular en before the plural number trettio?
Using en before a number greater than one is a common Swedish way to express an approximation. Here, en trettio means "about thirty" or "roughly thirty".
Why is it sina rather than deras for "their banners", considering the main subject of the sentence is the police?
The reflexive sina refers back to the logical subject of the action it belongs to. Since the demonstrators are the ones doing the carrying (bära), they act as the subject of that specific action. If you used deras, it would mean the demonstrators were carrying someone else's banners!
Why is there no att before the verb bära?
When låta is used to mean "to let" or "to allow", it is followed by an object and a bare infinitive. Just like in English where we say "let them carry" rather than "let them to carry", Swedish drops the att here.
The English translation uses the plural "the riot police let", but the Swedish word kravallpolisen is singular. Why?
In Swedish, polisen (the police) is generally treated as a singular collective noun referring to the police force as a whole unit. If you wanted to talk about multiple individual riot police officers, you would use the plural kravallpoliserna.
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