Page:A Danish and Dano-Norwegian grammar.djvu/100

86 2) Those ending in -es or -s with preceding consonant. Exception: tilfreds satisfied always takes the -e, and aflægs obsolete, dagligdags commonplace, and gammeldags old-fashioned may take it; Ex.: det altid tilfredse Barn the always satisfied child.

3) Most adjectives ending in a stressed vowel; Ex.: blaa blue, tro faithful, ædru sober, bly bashful; fri and ny may in D. be written and pronounced with or without -e, frie and nye or fri and ny; in Norwegian always with -e: nye, frie; so also N. stöe.

179. The following adjectives lack the definite form in -e: megen much, anden other, egen own (but egen peculiar, egne). N. liden has the definite form lille.

These adjectives also have irregular plurals: megen—mange, anden—andre; liden uses as plural smaa small; faa few occurs only in plural; smaa, however, may also occur in singular, mostly neuter with collective words: smaat Kvæg small cattle, den smaa the little one.

180. Indeclinable are, besides those adjectives ending in -e, -es or -s with preceding consonant mentioned in §§ 174, 4 and 178, 1 and 2, the following: idel sheer, lutter mere, nok sufficient, kvit rid of, alene alone (only used predicatively), var in the expression blive var to become aware of (but N. adj. var cautious, is declinable). Also lig like, equal may in mathematics and elsewhere be used unchanged: et Tal lig Summen of to andre a number equal to the sum of two others.

181. Use of the definite form of the adjectives: The definite form of the adjective is used 1) after the definite article: det store Hus the big house; 2) after a possessive pro-