"Hæren mottok en sjokkerende ordre fra presidenten."

[weerwater]

The 'Feelings' skill uses the verb 'å motta' in this sentence in stead of the verb 'å få'.

I wonder, should this 'mottok' not rather be read to mean that the army welcomed the orders of the president, in fact contrasting the shocking content of these orders.

mot|ta verb (av III mot)

1 hilse velkommen, ta imot
motta gjester /
vi ble mottatt på stasjonen av venner og kjente /
bli godt, dårlig mottatt /
nyheten ble mottatt med sorg /
alle bidrag mottas med takk /
boka, filmen, forestillingen ble godt mottatt

gi foretrede
bli mottatt i audiens hos paven

2 få, bli overrakt, akseptere, ta imot
vi har mottatt Deres brev /
motta belønning /
motta en pris, en utmerkelse /
hun ville ikke motta betaling

Would it not be more natural to use 'fikk' in this context?

The discussion on their site does not give any information on DL's choice.

[Olav]

It simply means 'receive'.
And your dictionary is insufficient, this one is much better: https://naob.no/ordbok/motta

[anamorphism]

as far as i know, å motta is generally used when you're actually there to receive the thing. the focus is on the recipient in a way.

so, you generally motta orders. you motta guests because you are there to show them in to your home. you motta a package if you're there and someone places it in your hands.

å få is more focused on the thing just being there. so you can få many things that you can motta as well, but the nuance can be a bit different. "vi fikk gjester" would be more like people randomly showing up at your place vs. "vi mottok gjester" would be more that you planned on them showing up. "jeg mottok brevet ditt" is more i was handed your letter and am confirming i was there to take ownership of it vs. "jeg fikk brevet ditt" which is more that i am confirming your letter showed up in my mailbox at some point.

[weerwater]

[mention]Olav[/mention];[mention]anamorphism[/mention]

Thank you again. Your help is much appreciated. As a student I need to get some grip on how similar concepts are used by natives.
Since the exercise is part of the DL 'feelings' skill, I would have expected some discussion on the differences on the DL site too.
I followed your suggestion and also looked up the verb 'få' in the Naob dictionary. Which is a more abstract or random type of receiving, than 'mottå', like you explained.
Looking around on the web, Norwegian media at least, do seem to use the verb 'få' in relation to getting orders in headlines quite regularly. Particularly applied in connection to a certain "harshness" of these orders.

• https://www.abcnyheter.no/nyheter/verde ... epe-sivile

• https://steigan.no/2022/02/legen-som-op ... n-alvorlig

These kind of examples could well be just personal preference of the author, but were probably deliberately chosen to cover the content of the story following it. The more 'abstract' character of 'få' would then be the indicator of what is to follow.

[Olav]

As I see it, "å motta" is a bit more formal than "å få".
A notch even more formal, is "å bli tildelt / å tildeles". https://no.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liste_ove ... r_Harald_V