An Icelandic minigrammar

Icelandic has a complicated inflectional system since nouns, adjectives, pronouns, numerals and the definite article are inflected for gender, number and case and verbs are inflected for person, number, tense, mood and voice. Unlike Danish, Swedish and Norwegian Icelandic has for the most part preserved the Old Norse inflectional system. The normal word order in Icelandic is subject - verb - object and usually the inflected verb is in the second position, in main clauses as well as in subordinate clauses.

Nouns refer to living, dead and intangible things (hestur "horse", hús "house", fer_ "journey"). One of the most distinctive things about Icelandic nouns is the suffixed definite article -inn, -in or -i_. There are three genders: masculine (m.), feminie (f.) and neuter (n.). Icelandic nouns are declined for four cases: nominative (nom.), accusative (acc.), dative (dat.) and genitive (gen.) and two numbers: singular (sg.) and plural (pl.). When a noun has a final vowel in all cases singular it has a weak declension but otherwise it has a strong declension. Normally the inflectional endings are suffixed to the noun. In table (1) is an example of an inflection of a definite noun where the difinite article is in bold:

(1)

These examples do not describe the whole inflection since some masculine words are suffixed with -ar in the genitive singular and -ir in the nominative plural. In addition there are some strong female words that have the suffix -ar or -ur in the nominative and accusative plural. However it is right to mention that there are some general rules that apply to the declension of nouns. For example the dative plural has a final -um in all genders and genitive plural ends with the suffix -a excepting certain weak female words and most weak neuters that are suffixed with -na instead. The female accusative and dative are the same and the neuter accusative, singular and plural are always the same.

Adjectives describe qualities of living, dead or intangible things. Icelandic adjectives agree with the nouns that they qualify and are inflected for gender, number and case.

There is a strong and a weak inflection. If an adjective has a final vowel in all cases the inflection is weak but if it has a final consonant in genitive singular it is a strong inflection. Strong inflection is usually used when adjectives qualify nouns that are without the definite article but a weak inflection is used with definite nouns: Hann á ríka (f. sg. acc. str. infl.) konu "he has a rich wife", Ég _ekki ríku (f. sg. w. infl.) konuna "I know the rich woman". When adjectives are used predicatively or as an apposition they only have strong inflection: María er rík (f. nom. sg.) "Marie is rich", Jón dó ríkur (m. nom. sg.) "John died rich". In (2) is an overview of the inflection of an adjective where the inflectional ending is in bold.

As can be seen from this table, the weak inflection is the same in all genders plural.

In Icelandic the adjective is also inflected for comparison and the most common endings in the comparative and the superlative are -ari/-astur in masculine, -ari/-ust in feminine and -ara/-ast in neuter, see (3).

(3)

In Icelandic pronouns are inflected for gender, number and case. Pronouns can be used attributively and agree with the nouns that they qualify: Ég á _ennan (m.sg.acc.) hund (m.sg.acc.) "I own this dog", _ú átt _essa (f.sg.acc.) kisu (f.sg.acc.) "you own this cat". Pronouns are divided into many categories but most of them get the same inflectional suffixes as strong adjectives. However the inflection of personal pronouns is rather irregular as can be seen in the overwiev in (4):

(4)

In Icelandic, some numerals are inflected for gender, number and case. Ordinals normally get the same inflectional suffixes as weak adjectives but the numerals tveir "two", _rír "three" and fjórir "four" get strong inflectional endings: Tveir hestar (m.) "two horses", Tvær bækur (f.) "two books", Tvö börn (n.) "two children". The numeral einn "one" can get both weak and strong inflectional endings: Einn hestur (m.) "one horse", Ein bók (f.) "one book", Eitt auga (n.) "one eye", Eini ma_urinn (m. weak infl.) "one man-the: the only man". Cardinals higher than four are not inflected at all: Fimm hestar (m.) "five horses", Fimm bækur (f.) "five books", Fimm augu (n.) "five eyes". In (5) is an overview of the inflection of numerals.

Verbs denote what happens: Vi_ förum í sund "we go swimming", Ég bor_a fisk "I eat fish". Icelandic verbs are conjugated for person, number, tense and mood. Most verbs have weak conjugation but some have strong conjugation. The weak conjugation is characterized by the past tense suffixes -_, -s or -t: Ég skrifa "I write", Ég skrifa_i "I wrote". Strong verbs are on the other hand without inflectional endings in first person, singular, past tense and form the past with a change in the stem vowel: Ég les "I read", Ég las "I read" (past tense).

There are six moods in Icelandic. The Indicative is the most common one and is for example used in statements: Hann talar miki_ "he talks much", _i_ lesi_ bókina "you read the book". The Subjunctive is used to express hope, wish or something unreal: _ú læsir bókina er _ú gætir "you would read the book if you could", Ef ég væri sterkari lemdi ég hann "if I was stronger I would hit him". Subjunctive is also used with some conjunctions and in indirect speech: _ó hún sofi miki_ er hún alltaf _reytt "though she sleeps much she is always tired", Hann sag_i a_ skipi_ færi á morgun "he said that the ship would leave tomorrow". The Imperative is used for commands and normally it is formed by the suffixes -du, -_u or -tu, but they are derived from the personal pronoun _ú "you": Lestu bókina! "read the book!", Komdu strax! "come immediately!", Far_u! "go!". The imperative plural has the same form as indicative and subjunctive: Lesi_ bókina! "read the book!". The present participle is formed by the suffix -andi and is uninflected: _ú kemur gangandi "you come walking", S_ni_ gangandi vegfarendum tillitssemi "pay attention to walking passers-by". The past participle is formed with auxiliaries like hafa "have" and geta "can": Ég hef lesi_ bókina "I have read the book", Ég get lesi_ bókina "I can read the book". In the passive voice the past participle agrees with the nominative subject in gender, number and case: _eir (m. pl. nom) voru handteknir (m. pl. nom.) "they were arrested", _ær (f. pl. nom.) voru handteknar (f. pl. nom.) "they were arrested". The Infinitive is formed by the suffix -a: Lesa "to read", koma "to come", skrifa "to write". In (5) the conjugation of the strong verb bíta ‘bite’ is shown:

(5)

There are two tenses in Icelandic, the present and the past tense. The present tense is used for things that take place in the present, in the future and for conventional acts: Ég veit svari_ "I know the answer", Hann fer á morgun "he goes tomorrow", _au hjóla oft í vinnuna "they often bicycle to work". The past tense is used for things that take place in the past: _au hjólu_u í vinnuna "they bicycled to work", Hann fór í gær "he went yesterday". Compound tenses can be made by auxiliaries, e.g. perfect tense and future: Ég hef hjóla_ í vinnuna "I have bicycled to work", Vi_ munum fara í dag "we will go today".

Some verbs are conjugated for three voices: Active voice, passive voice and middle voice. Active voice is used most: Ég baka_i brau_ "I baked bread". Passive voice is formed with the auxiliaries vera "to be" or ver_a "to become": Brau_i_ var baka_ "the bread was baked". Middle voice is formed with the suffix -st: Brau_i_ baka_ist vel "the bread was well baked".

In Icelandic, u-umlaut is active in conjugation. It changes the letter a into ö if u is in the next syllable: Ég kalla "I call", Vi_ köllum "we call". U-umlaut has an affect in the declension of nouns and adjectives as well: Kaka "cake" - kökur "cakes", Gla_an "glad" (acc.) - glö_um "glad" (dat.). U-umlaut is ocasionally used in inflection: Barn "a child" - börn "children", Gla_ur "happy" (m.) - glö_ "happy" (f.).

Icelandic is an SVO language which means that the normal word order puts the subject in the first position, the verb in the second position and the object comes after the verb. Icelandic is also an S2-language and that means that the tensed verb is usually in the second position after the first constituent, whether it is a main verb or an auxiliary. This can be seen in the following examples where the tensed verb is in bold and the first constituent is underlined:

In wh-questiones the wh-constituent is in the first position but in yes/no questiones the tensed verb is in the first positon:

The rule of the tensed verb in the second position is also valid in subordinate clauses. This can be seen by the fact that the verb comes after the negation:

As already mentioned, nouns, adjectives, pronouns and numerals are declined for four cases; nominative, accusative, dative and genitive. Words are normally in the nominative unless they are governed by some other word or constituent in the sentence. Prepositions and verbs can assign accusative, dative and genitive and nouns can assign genitive: