Essential North Sami Verbs Every Beginner Needs To Know
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Learning a few essential North Sami verbs will immediately improve your ability to build basic sentences.
Verbs are the action words that give meaning to everything you want to say.
North Sami verbs change their endings based on who is doing the action.
I’ll show you the most important everyday verbs and exactly how to use them.
Table of Contents:
The verb leat (to be)
The verb leat is the absolute most common verb in North Sami.
You need it to introduce yourself, describe things, and tell people where you are.
Because it’s so common, it’s an irregular verb that you just need to memorize.
To keep things simple for beginners, here’s how you say “I am”, “you are”, and “he/she is” in the singular present tense.
| Pronoun | North Sami | English translation |
|---|---|---|
| Mun (I) | lean | am |
| Don (You) | leat | are |
| Son (He/She) | lea | is |
Here’s how you use this verb in a basic conversation.
Mun lean Inga.
Gos don leat?
The verb mannat (to go)
You’ll use the verb mannat when talking about leaving or travelling to a specific place.
North Sami verbs undergo a spelling change when you conjugate them from the dictionary form.
When you say “I go”, the double ‘n’ in mannat becomes a single ‘n’.
This means “I go” translates to mun manan.
Mun manan ruoktot.
Son manná skuvlii.
The verb boahtit (to come)
The verb boahtit is the exact opposite of going.
You’ll use this word constantly when telling people where you’re from or asking others to join you.
When you say “I come”, the ‘ht’ in the middle of the word changes to a ‘đ’.
Therefore, “I come” translates to mun boađán.
Mun boađán Guovdageainnus.
Boađát go don?
The verb borrat (to eat)
Food is a major part of everyday life and culture, making borrat a highly necessary word.
Just like our previous examples, the double consonant ‘rr’ changes to a single ‘r’ when talking about yourself.
This means “I eat” becomes mun boran.
Mun boran láibbi.
Son borrá guoli.
The verbs hállat and sámástit (to speak)
When you’re learning a new language, you’ll frequently need to talk about speaking.
The general verb for “to speak” is hállat.
However, North Sami has a special, specific verb just for speaking the Sami language.
That word is sámástit, which literally means “to speak Sami”.
Mun hálan eaŋgalsgiela.
Sámastat go don?
Focus on learning the “I” and “you” forms first so you can start having simple conversations right away.
