r/norsk • u/dwchandler • Sep 10 '17

Søndagsspørsmål #192 - Sunday Question Thread

This is a weekly post to ask any question that you may not have felt deserved its own post, or have been hesitating to ask for whatever reason. No question too small or silly!

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u/Eberon Sep 14 '17

I stumbled across this headline:

Bergen må være stolte av sykkel-VM

I'm curious about the plural form stolte since Bergen is singular. Does Norwegian the same as English and treats singular words as plural when they denote a group of people? (E.g. "The police are coming.")

Or is there a complete other reason it's stolte?

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u/RoomRocket Native Speaker Sep 14 '17

My logical sense tells me that by "Bergen" it implicitly refers to the people of Bergen, not the actual Bergen city. How can a city be proud?

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u/Eberon Sep 15 '17

Yes, Bergen here refers to the collective of the people living in the town. But the word Bergen itself is nonetheless singular, not plural.