LENGO
App
Languages
Stories
Become a creator
Featuring program
Affiliate program
Beta program
one sec × LENGO
Contact & help
About LENGO
Team & jobs
Press kit
Privacy
Terms
LENGO · NorwegianGrammar lessons
Study “Possession: Pers bil / bilen til Per”: read the rule, then use it to complete three sentences from the lesson.
Who writes the lessons?
Professional language teachers write the vocabulary and grammar. If you spot a mistake, long-press the word to report it. Our team checks every report.
Each lesson explains the rule with examples, then you practice it in sentences.
Possession: Pers bil / bilen til Per
Norwegian shows possession in two ways.
1. The s-genitive: add -s to the owner, with no apostrophe: Pers sykkel (Per's bike), Norges hovedstad (Norway's capital), mammas telefon (Mum's phone). It also works with definite nouns: byens eldste kirke (the town's oldest church).
- If the name already ends in -s, -x or -z, add only an apostrophe: Lars' bursdag, Jonas' bror.
- The thing owned gets no article and no definite ending: Pers bil, not Pers bilen.
2. The til-genitive is very common in speech: the thing in the definite form + til + the owner: bilen til Per (Per's car), hunden til naboen (the neighbour's dog).
Both mean the same; the s-genitive sounds a little more written.
Try it yourself
(Mamma) telefon ligger på kjøkkenbordet.Show answer
Mammas telefon ligger på kjøkkenbordet.
Det er bilen Kari som står ute.Show answer
Det er bilen til Kari som står ute.
Hva heter (Erik) hund?Show answer
Hva heter Eriks hund?