Icelandic Numbers: 1 - 4

[@ThorirPP]

Very good video. Few additional points about the "collective" plurals: While "einn" simply has (mostly) regular singular and plural forms like any other adjective, and "tveir" "þrír" and "fjórir" are always plural (i.e. have no singular form), the "plurals" of two/three/four in Icelandic (tvennir, þrennir, fernir) actually have regular singular forms as well (tvennur/tvenn/tvennt, þrennur/þrenn/þrennt, fern/fern/fernt). In fact, these three words are original adjectives that meant something like "twofold/threefold/fourfold" or "in twos/threes/fours" The usage of these singular forms are very similar to the usage of the plurals, i.e. that being that they are used generally with words that only exist in the singular (f.ex. "tvennt fólk" meaning "two peoples"). However, since almost all words that only exist in the singular in Icelandic are mass nouns that aren't usually counted like this, mostly the singular is only seen when talking about something unspecified, since in Icelandic an unspecific something can only be talked about in the neuter singular. Examples: "ég vil tvennt af öllu" (I want two of everything) "þú stalst eitthverju þrennu" (you stole three of something), "hann skar það í tvennt" (he cut it in two), "hún hefur fernt í huga" (she has four things in mind) Other cases of the singular forms are in many fixed phrases, like f.ex. "tvenns/þrenns/ferns konar" (two/three/four different types/kind), "á tvennan/þrennan/fernan hátt" (in two/three/four different ways) "í tvennu/þrennu/fernu lagi" (in two/three/four parts)

[@icelandicforforeigners]

This is great! I elected not to go into the singular forms of tvennir, þrennir, and fernir in this video but I'm happy you addressed them.

[@FrozenMermaid666]

Does anyone know why does the verb að bjarga take the dative? If the one being saved is a direct object and there is no third party involved that would receive something, shouldn’t it logically take the accusative? And isn’t the verb að fara supposed to take the accusative too? For example, if I say lestin ferst á járnbrautum, why does járnbraut take the dative? Because on wkp it says that að fara and að farast take the accusative and that á can take both the dative and the accusative, but every example uses the dative form with the um ending, so I am a bit confused about some of the verb uses and preposition uses!

[@FrozenMermaid666]

By the way, I tend to modify some of the forms to make them better! For example, for the number four, I use the forms fjórir (n) and fjóri (a) and fjórrum (d) and fjogurra (g) for masculines and the forms fjórar (n) and fjóra (a) and fjórum (d) and fjægurra (g) for feminines and the forms fjögur (n) and fjögru (a) and fjórtum (d) and fjögurra (g) for neutrals, because the ones with a at the end should be only used with feminines as they sound feminine, and each form should be a bit different, though both forms could be used, honestly, so even I might be using both forms interchangeably, and, for two, I would use the forms tveir / tvo / tveimur / tveggrija for masculines and tvær / tvæ / tveim / tveggraja (?) for feminines and tvör / tvö / tveimu / tveggja for neutrals, though I am not sure about the two genitive forms as these are not easy to modifying, so maybe I could come up with better forms in the future - also, for the ones with tvenn, I would use the forms tvennir / tvenni / tvennirum / tvennira for masculines and tvennar / tvenna / tvennarum / tvennara for feminines and tvenn / tvennu / tvennum / tvennra for neutrals, and so on, as I applied these endings to all others as well! For the weak forms, I use the one with i at the end only for masculines in all cases, the one with a at the end only for feminines in all cases, and the one with u at the end for neutrals in all cases, and I have applied this change to all the adjectives as well, and for plurals I keep the same endings + an extra R added before the last i / a / u for the weak forms! I also modified the pronunciation of certain words, for example, the words full / fullur etc I pronounce the with a normal L sound because T sounds don’t go well with Fs that are followed by U, and it sounds best with the L sound, so I highly recommend that all be doing the same! And for the words that have letter combinations like u+lag / legur etc, I took the U letter out, because it’s way better would the U sound in such case, and sometimes I use an A instead of U, depending on the word, for example, koma + lag and skip + lag instead of skipu / komu + lag, plus I am creating some extra words, as I noticed that Icelandic and Norse don’t have a literal translation for certain English words, for example, the word echo doesn’t seem to exist In Icelandic and Norse, and I created the forms einn ekó / ekóinn / ekóir / ekóirnir etc, and I also created a prettier form for the word that means cake because it deserves a prettier word than kax2, so I created the masculine forms kæjkí / kæjk / kæjku / kæjks /// kæjkíinn / kæjkinn / kæjkinum and kæjknum / kæjksins /// kæjkir / kæjkirn and kæjkri / kæjkum / kæjka /// kæjkirnir / kæjkana / kæjkunum / kæjkanna (the æ should be pronounced E in this case, as it sounds better with an EY sound) and even an extra feminine version kækja / kækjan etc, but I am not really sure about this one, as it still has a letter that looks like A between two Ks, but it would work well in pronunciation if pronounced with an E vowel instead, so, maybe keykja / keykjan would be better!

[@FrozenMermaid666]

Still, for me it’s not easy to understand how can numbers like two and three and four have singular forms, because they are multiple things basically - or are the singular forms only used when telling the time or something like that, I don’t know, though I guess one could say three 2s etc even in English, when referring to the number itself as a symbol!

[@gilhalle9226]

your lessons are well structured and extremely helpful, thank you

[@icelandicforforeigners]

Thank you, my friend.

[@gilhalle9226]

@@icelandicforforeigners would this be the correct way to say 'I like to practice my icelandic" : Mér finnst gaman að æfa íslensku ?

[@FrozenMermaid666]

I think it is correct, but mér finnst gaman að æfa Íslensku literally means to me finds (or feels) fun to practice Icelandic - gaman means fun or pleasure or enjoyment (it is cognate with game) and mér means to me in English and a mí in Spanish!

[@alittlebird3818]

I'm astonished by the existence of collective numbers. I'm a german learning many slavic languages and most of them also have such collective numbers refering to nouns with no singular form and the number 1 also has a plural form Polish: Drzwi = door Jedne drzwi = one door Drzwi is plural only and jedne is in the plural declension despite being the word for "one". It's really interesting

[@alittlebird3818]

And the numbers 1-4 decline in all cases Bigger numbers also do that but the amount of forms is smaller, so this is another similar factor

[@icelandicforforeigners]

Very similar to Russian!

[@FrozenMermaid666]

Polish and Russian etc are just avrg, they don’t have mostly pretty words, and I highly recommend learning Slovene instead of Polish and Russian and other Slavic languages, as Slovene is the prettiest Slavic language - I highly recommend learning the prettiest languages ever Icelandic / Norse / Dutch / English / Norwegian / Gothic / Faroese / Welsh / Breton / Cornish / Danish 2gether, as they are the prettiest and most refined and most poetic and most modern and coolest languages ever, which are way too pretty not to know, and Slovene and Hungarian can also be learnt 2gether with them!

[@alittlebird3818]

@@FrozenMermaid666 i have another opinion

[@watchmakerful]

Slavic languages (e. g. Russian or Ukrainian) have a plural "one" as well ("odni"), and it is used in the same situation: with nouns that have no singular. The only difference is that it has no gender (in East Slavic languages, the situation can be different in other branches). For other numbers (two, three, four) we use either special "collective" numerals ("dvoje, troje, četvero") or additional singular nouns, like in "pair of pants".

[@icelandicforforeigners]

Very interesting! I started learning Russian a year and a half ago and was struck by the many similarities. Thank you for sharing!

[@Daniel_Firmino]

Great video, this channel is really special, keep going. About the plural of one it's not a feature exclusive to Iceland a lot of romance languages have that too just for the sake of agreement.

[@lukasandersson2335]

Yes, thanks to my native language (Spanish) is not that hard to understand the "plural 2, 3 & 4" 😄

[@lucyr878]

Great lesson!!!!!

[@mihaly1027]

ive watched all your videos & i must say im very grateful for them! They’ve given me an amazing overview of a lot of most important grammar point & a great foundation to continue studies. I hope to see more of your new content in the future & I’ll certainly be revisiting different topics you’ve discussed along the journey. Þakka þér fyrir og haltu áfram að hjálpa okkur!

[@icelandicforforeigners]

Thank you for your kind words!

[@lucyr878]

Great video! Thank you so much!

[@kentroper8601]

Takk! I already had a decent grasp on the stuff you covered in the first ten minutes of the video, but only a vague understanding of the more complicated stuff. Will you go over collective plurals in the next video as well? For example, does "Hún á fimm skó" mean "She has 5 pairs of shoes" or does it mean "She has 5 shoes"?

[@icelandicforforeigners]

Yes, I will talk about it!

[@Sindrijo]

Just a note, I think saying 'Ég á eina sokka' is pretty rare, most people would probably use 'Ég á eitt par af sokkum.' or 'Ég á eitt sokkapar' instead.

[@icelandicforforeigners]

Takk Sindri!

[@annatraustadottir4387]

Bendi á: "Hann hlaup heim á tveimur mínútum" á að vera "Hann hljóp heim á tveimur mínútum"

[@icelandicforforeigners]

Takk, alveg rétt hjá þér! Veit ekki hvernig ég missti af því 🙃

[@jonasbenjamin645]

Enn einu sinni mjög spennandi myndband! Ég vissi ekki, að orðið “fjögurra” verði borið fram eins og “fjægurra”, slíkar ábendingar eru mjög gagnlegar, takk fyrir!

[@icelandicforforeigners]

Verði þér að góðu!

[@ThorirPP]

"fjögurra" er í raun borið fram eins og "fjagra" (ekki "fjægurra"). Það er líka stundum borið fram sem "fjögra", en "fjagra" er miklu meira algengari framburður.

[@theskoomacat7849]

Plural one in English: "They are the ones who..."

[@hadiarahman4223]

I have a question why hundar or kisur in plural nomenative and how about sitja is sitja verb is nomenative???

[@annatraustadottir4387]

Flott myndband en bendi á að enginn myndi segja "Hún býr í því eina húsi í götunni". Þetta ÞVÍ á ekki heima þarna. Eðlileg setning væri "Hún býr í eina húsinu (verður að hafa greini hér) í götunni.

[@icelandicforforeigners]

Takk fyrir ábendinguna! Mjög gott að vita 🙂

[@BobleeSwaggner]

Great video :) Plural one exists in Russian Одни очки - /adn’i achk’i/ ultimate stress both words A pair of glasses Одни глаза /adn’i glazA/ A pair of eyes Одни часы /adn’i chasy/ U.S. as well “y” does not exist in non Slavic languages. Ы is hard for anglophones to learn A clock/watch

[@icelandicforforeigners]

Thanks! I am learning Russian and you are right, ы is difficult.

[@El_Rusofilo]

The use of "one" to mean "alone" (discussed in 4:55) also exists in Russian (for example: он один дома). In fact, I've already spotted many similarities between Russian and Icelandic. People who know Slavic languages can easily be carried away when they first see the feminine weak declension :D Many of these similarities can be of course explained by the fact that they are both indoeuropean languages, but some of them are very specific (for example: the sound of the letter ó, the palatalization of velars before front vowels or similar constructions like "'ég er með" / "у меня есть"). Now, according to the Norman Theory, the founders of the first Russian state were Scandinavians, so this could be an explanation.

[@BobleeSwaggner]

@@icelandicforforeigners if you’re interested in Russian resources just scroll the playlists on my channel. I have a ton of stuff saved there

[@icelandicforforeigners]

Yes, I have seen tons of similarities between Icelandic and Russian. I was particularly surprised by the amount of impersonal sentences in Russian, like мне кажется and мне жолодно which are very similar to Icelandic mér finnst and mér er kalt. I have been enjoying learning Russian immensely!

[@fabianquintanar979]

and how would yo say "four solstices"? solstice is an only plural word but still we say "fjögur sólstöður" and not "fern sóltöður". Why?

[@icelandicforforeigners]

Hmmm...I have never heard 'fjögur sólstöður' before. Sólstöður is a feminine plural word, so I would expect it to be 'fernar sólstöður.' It seems unlikely that anyone would use fjögur unless sólstöður was reanalyzed as a neuter singular word, which I can't find any evidence of. Where did you see 'fjögur sólstöður'?

[@DanielleGalietti]

Hún býr í því eina húsi í götunni

[@icelandicforforeigners]

Því can have several translations. In this case, it is the dative neuter form of the demonstrative pronoun "that". Sometimes you use the demonstrative pronoun sá/sú/það when you are going to give more information about the noun afterward. But I should say that an Icelander commented on this video and said it would sound more natural to say "í eina húsinu". Því can also mean "because," or be used as the dative neuter pronoun after a verb or preposition (e.g. Ég gleymdi því).

[@DanielleGalietti]

@@icelandicforforeigners Takk kærlega fyrir alla hjálpina!