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SWEDISH WORD OF THE DAY

Swedish word of the day: vovve

If you're raising bilingual children in Sweden, this may very well be one of the first words as soon as they start to get a sense of the world around them.

Swedish word of the day: vovve
A dog is a 'hund' in Swedish, but it can also be a 'vovve'. Photo: Annie Spratt/Unsplash/Nicolas Raymond

While a Swedish dog is usually known as a hund, the word vovve – or vovvar in plural – is commonly used as a more diminutive word in speech directed at children (or by owners talking to their dogs).

Vovve, which the Swedish Academy dates back to 1867, is a form of onomatopoeia – words that imitate the sounds they describe – and comes from the word vov-vov, which is the sound the dog makes in Swedish.

You can compare this to for example “woof” in English or “bau” in Italian.

Vovve also appears in the Swedish phrase villa, volvo, vovve, which refers to three adulting criteria that show you have become a sensible, successful grown-up: a house (not too flashy – the word villa in Swedish simply refers to any kind of detached house), a car and a dog.

But why do animals sound different in different languages? As you can probably guess, it is not that the animals are multilingual, it is that we perceive the sounds in different ways depending on our own language.

There is even one theory attributed to German philosopher Johann Gottfried Herder (although this is contested) which suggests that animal sounds contributed to the birth of human language – when our ancestors started imitating those sounds they heard in their natural environment.

Other Swedish animal noises include kuckeliku, nöff and gnägg. Ten points if you can guess which animals they are associated with, otherwise here’s a cheat sheet.

Examples

Titta, vilken söt liten vovve

Look, what a cute little dog

Duktig vovve

Good dog

Har du kommit ihåg att mata vovvarna?

Have you remembered to feed the dogs?

Villa, Volvo, Vovve: The Local’s Word Guide to Swedish Life, written by The Local’s journalists, is available to order in English or German. Head to lysforlag.com/vvv to read more about it.

It is also possible to buy your copy from Amazon USAmazon UKBokus or Adlibris.

Member comments

  1. There is an old English music hall song that goes, (chorus),

    Daddy wouldn’t buy me a bow-wow (bow-wow).
    Daddy wouldn’t buy me a bow-wow (bow-wow).
    I’ve got a little cat,
    and I’m very fond of that,
    but I’d rather have a bow-wow-wow.

    That bow-wow corresponds to the Swedish vovve.

    /Kurt

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For members

SWEDISH WORD OF THE DAY

Swedish word of the day: kondis

Today’s word has two meanings: one is healthy, the other less so.

Swedish word of the day: kondis

Kondis is a great example of a Swedish slang word ending in -is, which essentially is the shortened version of a longer word.

Somewhat confusingly, in the case of kondis, there are actually two similar words which have both been shortened in this way, resulting in one word with two different meanings.

The first meaning comes from konditori, the Swedish version of a patisserie or bakery, which you might recognise from the German word Konditor (a confectioner or pastry chef), originally from the Latin word condītor, which referred to a person who preserved, pickled or seasoned food.

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The word kondis can either refer to a konditori itself, or to the type of baked goods and pastries they offer. A kondis differs somewhat from a bageri (bakery), which is more likely to focus on savoury or rustic baked goods, like bread (although many kondis also sell bread, and many bagerier will serve some sort of cake or sweet treat too). 

A kondis is also more likely to have some area where you can sit and enjoy your food on-site, perhaps with a cup of tea or coffee, while bakeries are more likely to be take-away only.

The second meaning of kondis is a shortened version of the word kondition, which translates roughly as your endurance or fitness. If you’re good at running, you might be described as having bra kondition or bra kondis, roughly equal to being fit. 

Another similar slang word for this in Swedish would be flås, which technically translates to “panting”, but can be used in the same way as kondis to describe physical endurance or fitness.

Example sentences:

Om man äter för mycket kondis kan man få dålig kondis.

If you eat too many pastries you could end up less fit.

Sprang du hela vägen hit? Du måste ha bra kondis!

Did you run the whole way here? You must be in good shape.

Villa, Volvo, Vovve: The Local’s Word Guide to Swedish Life, written by The Local’s journalists, is available to order. Head to lysforlag.com/vvv to read more about it. It is also possible to buy your copy from Amazon USAmazon UKBokus or Adlibris.

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