telja is a deceptively small verb that does two big jobs. Its plain meaning is "to count" — telja peningana "count the money," telja til tíu "count to ten." But its second use is the one that earns it a B2 page: telja also means "to believe, reckon, consider," and in that sense it takes a famous Icelandic construction — an accusative subject plus an infinitive: ég tel hann *vera góðan "I consider him to be good." This is *Exceptional Case Marking (ECM, or accusative-with-infinitive), and it is the single thing English speakers most often get wrong with telja, because English lets you say either "I believe that he is good" or "I believe him to be good," while Icelandic telja strongly favours the accusative-plus-infinitive frame. The verb itself is a weak j-verb with the classic vowel alternations: an i-umlaut a → e in the present (tel) and u-umlaut a → ö in the past plural (töldu). Orthography: the past is taldi (with l, stem tal-), the present singular is tel (e-vowel), and the past plural carries ö in töldu / töldum / tölduð.
Conjugation
Class: weak j-verb (the -di preterite with stem vowel alternations). Auxiliary: hafa — ég hef talið "I have counted / believed." The stem is tel-/tal-: an i-umlaut raises a → e in the present singular (tel, telur), the j surfaces before back vowels in the present plural (teljum, teljið, telja), and the past plural shows u-umlaut a → ö (töldum, tölduð, töldu).
| Principal parts | |
|---|---|
| Infinitive | að telja |
| 1sg present | tel |
| 1sg past | taldi |
| 3pl past | töldu |
| Supine | talið |
| Person | Present (nútíð) | Past (þátíð) |
|---|---|---|
| ég | tel | taldi |
| þú | telur | taldir |
| hann / hún / það | telur | taldi |
| við | teljum | töldum |
| þið | teljið | tölduð |
| þeir / þær / þau | telja | töldu |
| Person | Present subjunctive | Past subjunctive |
|---|---|---|
| ég | telji | teldi |
| þú | teljir | teldir |
| hann / hún / það | telji | teldi |
| við | teljum | teldum |
| þið | teljið | telduð |
| þeir / þær / þau | telji | teldu |
| Non-finite & imperative | |
|---|---|
| Imperative (þú) | teldu! |
| Imperative (þið) | teljið! |
| Supine | talið |
| Past participle (m/f/n) | talinn / talin / talið |
| Middle voice (miðmynd) | teljast — "to be counted / be considered, regard oneself as" |
telja — "count" (telja + accusative)
The literal meaning is the place to start: telja "to count, tally, enumerate," taking a plain accusative object. You telur the money, the votes, the days, the sheep.
Gjaldkerinn taldi peningana tvisvar til öryggis.
The cashier counted the money twice to be safe. — telja + accusative (peningana); the literal 'count' sense, past taldi.
Ég get ekki sofnað þó að ég telji kindur.
I can't fall asleep even if I count sheep. — telja + accusative (kindur); subjunctive 'telji' after þó að.
telja + accusative + infinitive — "believe / consider sb to be …" (ECM)
Here is the construction that makes telja a B2 verb. In its mental sense, telja means "believe, reckon, consider," and it takes an accusative noun phrase followed by an infinitive — most often vera "to be." The structure is:
tel + [accusative subject] + vera + predicate
So ég tel hann *vera góðan is literally "I consider *him to be good." The pronoun hann is accusative (the object of tel), and what follows is the infinitive vera, not a finite verb. Linguists call this Exceptional Case Marking: telja reaches across the clause boundary and assigns accusative to the subject of the lower (infinitival) clause, which is why it is "exceptional." The predicate adjective then agrees with that accusative noun (góðan, masculine accusative).
Ég tel hann vera einn af bestu þjálfurunum í deildinni.
I consider him to be one of the best coaches in the league. — ECM: accusative hann + infinitive vera + predicate; 'I believe him to be…'.
Hún telur mig vera duglegan, sem betur fer.
She considers me to be hardworking, thankfully. — ECM: accusative mig + vera + agreeing accusative adjective duglegan.
Margir telja þessa ákvörðun vera mistök.
Many consider this decision to be a mistake. — ECM: accusative þessa ákvörðun + vera + predicate noun.
You can also drop vera before a predicate noun or adjective in a formal, compressed register (ég tel hann góðan), but the full tel … vera … frame is the safe, transparent one to learn first. What you must not do is build a finite að-clause as if telja worked like English "believe that": ég tel að hann sé góður is grammatical but is a different construction (a that-clause with the subjunctive), and learners who try to splice the two — \ég tel hann er góður — produce the single most common *telja error.
teljast — "be counted / be considered" (the passive-ish middle)
The middle voice teljast turns the ECM construction around: instead of "X considers Y to be Z," you get "Y is considered (to be) Z." It is the everyday way to say something counts as or is regarded as something — þetta telst gott "this is considered good," hún telst meðal bestu "she counts among the best." The predicate after teljast is nominative, because the subject is now nominative.
Þetta telst ekki góð íslenska, þótt margir segi það.
This isn't considered good Icelandic, even though many say it. — teljast = be considered; predicate góð is nominative (agreeing with the subject).
Hann telst nú meðal fremstu rithöfunda þjóðarinnar.
He now counts among the nation's foremost writers. — teljast = be reckoned/counted among; literary register.
Common Mistakes
❌ Ég tel hann er góður.
The classic ECM error — telja takes an accusative subject + INFINITIVE, not a finite 'er'; you cannot insert a tensed verb.
✅ Ég tel hann vera góðan.
I consider him to be good.
This is the headline mistake. The object hann is accusative and is followed by the infinitive vera, with the adjective in the accusative (góðan). A finite er (and the nominative góður it would drag in) belongs to a different frame — ég tel að hann sé góður — not to the accusative-with-infinitive.
❌ Þeir teljaðu atkvæðin alla nóttina.
Incorrect — telja is a j-verb, not -aði; the past plural is 'töldu' (with u-umlaut), never 'teljaðu'.
✅ Þeir töldu atkvæðin alla nóttina.
They counted the votes all night.
The past is taldi / töldu, with u-umlaut (a → ö) in the plural. There is no regular -aði past.
❌ Við teljum peningana → *Við töljum peningana.
Incorrect present — the present plural is 'teljum' (the j-verb keeps a before back vowels), not a u-umlauted 'töljum'.
✅ Við teljum peningana.
We count the money.
U-umlaut hits the past plural (töldum), not the present plural. The present plural is teljum, teljið, telja with the j and a plain stem.
❌ Hún telst vera duglega.
Agreement/case error — after teljast the predicate is NOMINATIVE: 'dugleg', not the accusative 'duglega'.
✅ Hún telst (vera) dugleg.
She is considered (to be) hardworking.
With the active ECM telja, the predicate is accusative (tel hana vera duglega); with the middle teljast, the subject is nominative, so the predicate is nominative too (hún telst dugleg). Flip the case when you flip the voice.
Key Takeaways
- tel / telur / taldi / talið — a weak j-verb: present singular e (i-umlaut: tel), past plural ö (u-umlaut: töldu), past subjunctive teldi. Past participle talinn / talin / talið.
- Literal sense: telja + accusative = "count" (telja peningana).
- Mental sense: telja + accusative + infinitive (vera) = "consider/believe sb to be …" — Exceptional Case Marking. The object is accusative, the lower verb is an infinitive (tel hann vera góðan), and the predicate agrees in the accusative.
- Never *tel hann er — a finite verb cannot follow; that is the most common error. (ég tel að hann sé … is a separate að-clause construction.)
- The middle teljast = "be counted / be considered," with a nominative predicate (þetta telst gott). Auxiliary is hafa: ég hef talið.
Now practice Icelandic
Reading grammar gets you part of the way. The exercises are where it sticks — free, no signup needed.
Start learning Icelandic→Related Topics
- Raising, ECM, and ControlC1 — The three infinitival constructions that organise Icelandic complementation: subject-to-subject RAISING (virðast 'seem' — the lower subject moves up and keeps its case, so a quirky dative stays dative), Exceptional Case Marking / accusative-with-infinitive (ECM: telja 'believe' assigns accusative to the embedded subject — tel hann vera góðan), and CONTROL (a silent PRO coreferent with a matrix argument — lofa að koma). Case preservation under raising is the clinching evidence for quirky subjecthood and the centrepiece of the Icelandic syntax literature.
- halda (to hold / think / keep)A2 — Full conjugation of the strong verb halda (held / hélt / héldu / haldið), its two great senses — 'hold/keep' (+ dat.) and 'think/believe' (halda að…) — plus halda áfram, halda upp á, and the middle voice haldast.
- finnast vs þykja vs halda: 'Think/Seem'B1 — The 'think/seem/find' cluster that English collapses into one word: finnast (dative subject, a subjective impression — mér finnst þetta gott), þykja (dative subject, more formal and evaluative — mér þykir vænt um þig), and halda (ordinary nominative subject, a belief or conjecture — ég held að…). The case of the subject is the giveaway: an impression takes mér; a belief takes ég.
- Verbs and the Case of Their ObjectsB1 — Icelandic verbs assign a fixed case to their object that you cannot predict from meaning: most take the accusative (sjá hann), a sizable cluster take the dative (hjálpa honum), a few take the genitive (sakna hennar), and ditransitives take dative-then-accusative (gefa honum bók) — why object case is lexical, and the high-frequency dative-governing verbs to memorise.
- The Weak Preterite: -aði, -di, -ði, -tiA2 — How to choose and form the weak past tense — Class-1 -a verbs take -aði (tala → talaði, plural töluðum), Class-2 verbs take the short dental -di/-ði/-ti picked by the preceding sound (reyndi, dæmdi, keypti) — with the full tala paradigm and the 'when in doubt, -aði' default for unknown verbs.