Icelandic feminine singular indefinite dative -u
Posted: Wed Nov 03, 2010 7:24 am
I've been studying Icelandic on my own for about three years, and can speak it at a conversational level.
One thing that I still really haven't gotten the hang of, though, is why feminine datives in the indefinite singular sometimes take -u, when all the tables I've seen always list this form as the same as the nominative and the accusative (except for a couple of words such as hönd, of which this form is hendi).
The word I've mostly seen the -u with, is jörð, which tends to become jörðu in this form, but I know this from experience speaking and listening to Icelandic, rather than finding it in grammars, because tables always list this as jörð, in my experience.
This is the first sentence of the Icelandic Wikipedia article about solar eclipse:
"Sólmyrkvi (sem til forna var nefnt myrkur hið mikla) er það kallað þegar tunglið fer fyrir sólu frá jörðu."
As you can see, both sól and jörð get the -u here. So I'm very confused, as the tables I've seen show just sól and jörð.
I know out of experience that jörð is supposed to be jörðu, but I've not noticed it for sól before.
So do all fairly regular feminines take the -u in this form, or is it reserved for a few words? That would explain the misleading tables a bit better.
Also, would the definite form be jörðunni, or is it still jörðinni?
One thing that I still really haven't gotten the hang of, though, is why feminine datives in the indefinite singular sometimes take -u, when all the tables I've seen always list this form as the same as the nominative and the accusative (except for a couple of words such as hönd, of which this form is hendi).
The word I've mostly seen the -u with, is jörð, which tends to become jörðu in this form, but I know this from experience speaking and listening to Icelandic, rather than finding it in grammars, because tables always list this as jörð, in my experience.
This is the first sentence of the Icelandic Wikipedia article about solar eclipse:
"Sólmyrkvi (sem til forna var nefnt myrkur hið mikla) er það kallað þegar tunglið fer fyrir sólu frá jörðu."
As you can see, both sól and jörð get the -u here. So I'm very confused, as the tables I've seen show just sól and jörð.
I know out of experience that jörð is supposed to be jörðu, but I've not noticed it for sól before.
So do all fairly regular feminines take the -u in this form, or is it reserved for a few words? That would explain the misleading tables a bit better.
Also, would the definite form be jörðunni, or is it still jörðinni?
