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Icelandic

Icelandic

Summary

Icelandic is natively spoken by about 366,000 people, primarily in Iceland. It is integral to Icelandic cultural identity, known for its preservation of Old Norse literature and sagas. Written in the Latin alphabet, Icelandic grammar features a subject-verb-object (SVO) word order, noun cases to indicate grammatical relationships, and a complex system of verb conjugations that denote tense, mood, and voice.

Stats

  • Language Family: Indo-European

  • Writing System: Latin

  • Writing System Type: Alphabet

  • Writing Direction: L to R

  • Tones / Pitch Accent: N

  • Morphology: Fusional

  • Cases: 4

  • Grammatical Gender / Noun Class: 3

  • Number of Verb Tenses: 10

  • Word Order: SVO

  • Number of Vowels (Monophthongs): 8

  • Number of Consonants: 16

Areas Where Spoken

  • Iceland (official) (95.7%) (366 k)

Resources

Books

  • Book: Teach Yourself Icelandic / Complete Icelandic, by Hildur Jónsdóttir

  • Book: Colloquial Icelandic, by Daisy L. Neijmann


Websites

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