Ärlighet, öppenhet, verklighet… Honesty, openness, reality. These dynamic words are made possible by the Swedish suffix -het. Its English equivalents are -ty, -ity, and -ness, making it a noun-forming suffix. The three-letter addition of -het transforms simple adjectives into big-concept nouns. Words ending in -het are excellent additions to your intermediate and advanced vocabulary lists.

An Old Swedish suffix, –het was adopted from German’s -heid and English’s -hood. Because -het is a noun-forming suffix, it is able to shift the word’s meaning and part of speech. For example, the adjective vilsen means lost. Adding the suffix -het changes the word to vilsenhet, or forlornness. 

The most common endings associated with -het is -ity or -ty

nödvändig → nödvändighet
necessary → necessity

ärlig → ärlighet
honest → honesty

Once the noun has been created, it takes the Swedish article en and is declined in this way: 

stillhet → stillheten → stillheter → stillheterna
stillness → the stillness → stillnesses → the stillnesses

Overarching vocabulary pertaining to society, systems, politics, and philosophy, sort of “big picture” nouns, use the -het suffix. Many of them are also collective nouns:

allmänhet → general public

jämlikhet → equality

jämställdhet → equality, often refers to gender equality specifically

mänsklighet → humanity

svenskhet → Swedishness

myndighet → authority

medvetenhet → consciousness 

enhet  → unit / entity part of a bigger system, can also be used for “unity” 

helhet → in its entirety, wholeness

Egenskaper (characteristics) can be transformed into virtues or vices using -het. When doing this, the base form of the adjective is used (the form associated with en-category nouns), before adding the suffix. For example, the Swedish adjective independent, självständig, has a form for en, ett, and plural nouns:

en-category       ett-category nouns        plural nouns 
självständig            självständigt                      självständiga

We take the base form självständig, add -het, and pang, we’ve got självständighet (independence). As the Swedes would say, “lätt som en plätt”, “easy as pancakes.” 😉   More examples are as follows: 

dum → dumhet
dumb → stupidity

fientlig → fientlighet
hostile → hostility

försiktig → försiktighet
careful → caution

girig → girighet
greedy → greed

ödmjuk → ödmjukhet
humble → humility

god  → godhet
good → benevolence

Are you having fun shifting parts of speech with -het? Oftentimes, -het nouns are associated with both a verb and a noun, like these:

ADJEKTIV	VERB	-HET NOUN
stor → large	förstora → to increase size	storhet → magnitude
blek → pale	blekna → to fade	blekhet → pale/blandness
verklig → real/actual	förverkliga → to materialize	verklighet → reality
säker → certain	försäkra → to assure	säkerhet → certainty

Next week is the first post of the month, none other than the music blog! I won’t tell you which song we’re studying, but I will say that these three -het words are in the first verse:

1. bitterhet
2. verklighet 
3. äftlighet

Hmm… which song will it be?! Stay tuned!