övergår

övergår is a Swedish verb derived from the components över (“over, beyond”) and gå (“to go”). In contemporary usage it most commonly means to pass over or bypass; it can also refer to exceeding expectations or surpassing something. The verb is inflected as vanlig; ex. jag övergår gränsen, du övergår gränsen, han övergår gränsen, etc. It can be used both literally and metaphorically.

Literal usage: överblicka a physical surface, for example överborde in this context meaning “to cross over a river”. In a figurative sense it describes exceeding limits, for example övergår förväntningarna (“surpasses expectations”) or övergår tidpunkten (“goes beyond the scheduled time”). The verb is also found in idiomatic expressions. An example is övergår förståndet, an old Swedish idiom meaning “is beyond understanding” or “cannot be comprehended”.

Etymology The prefix över historically signals “over, above”, while gå is the root for motion. The compound originally described transgression of a boundary, and over time it broadened to include metaphorical surpassing or avoidance. The word is closely related to English surpass and overdo, sharing an older Germanic root *furjan.

Related forms include höra, near forms like förövergång, and phonetic variants such as övargå in dialects. In compound nouns it appears in words such as övergång (transition) or övergripande (comprehensive). Use of övergår is widespread in modern Swedish prose, journalism and everyday speech whenever there is a notion that something moves beyond a defined limit or that an expectation is exceeded.