Swedish verb· top 2,000 most common

gräva

dig

Meaning

dig

In Swedish: kasta upp jord; göra grop i marken

Conjugation

Conjugation of gräva (dig)
Infinitive	att gräva	to dig
Present	gräver	jag gräver
Past	grävde	jag grävde
Supine	grävt	used after har / hade
Perfect	har grävt	jag har grävt
Past perfect	hade grävt	jag hade grävt
Future	ska gräva	or: kommer att gräva
Conditional	skulle gräva	jag skulle gräva
Imperative	gräv!	a command
Present participle	grävande	-ing, used as an adjective
Past participle	grävd	used like an adjective, and agrees like one

Passive (-s form)

Passive of gräva
Infinitive	grävas
Present	grävs
Past	grävdes
Supine	grävts

Group 2: -er verbs. Present -er, past -de or -te (after a voiceless consonant), supine -t. Swedish verbs don't change for person: jag, du, hon, vi and de all use gräver. See the four verb groups explained.

Practise gräva

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Yesterday I … (gräva). Which is the past tense?

gräva in a sentence

gräva upp ett land
dig a garden
gräva ner sig i studier
bury oneself in one's studies
gräva fram något ur minnet
unearth a memory
Nisse grävde ett hål i marken med en spade
Nisse dug a hole in the ground with a shovel
gräva ner en skattkista
bury ("dig down") a treasure chest
gräva upp en skattkista
dig up a treasure chest
gräva ut ruiner
excavate ("dig out") ruins – usually implies archaeology
en utgrävning
an excavation ("out-digging") – usually implies archaeology

Words built with gräva

grävmaskin excavator

Questions

What does gräva mean in English?

gräva means “dig”.

What is the past tense of gräva?

The past tense of gräva is grävde (“jag grävde”). The supine is grävt, used in “jag har grävt”.

What is the present tense of gräva?

gräver, the same for every person: jag gräver, du gräver, vi gräver.

Origin

From Old Swedish grava, græva, from Old Norse grafa, from Proto-Germanic *grabaną, from Proto-Indo-European *gʰrābʰ-.

Nearby common words

gräva is number 1,187 in our frequency list. These words come just before and after it.

1,183stack went, left
1,184kyla cool, chill
1,185operation operation
1,186orsak cause
1,188mänsklig human, humane
1,189ljud sound
1,190orden order
1,191gåva present, gift

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Sources: Folkets lexikon (CC BY-SA 2.5) and Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 4.0), edited by Lingolib. Recording: Wikimedia Commons. Browse the dictionary