Questions & Answers about Skólinn er miklu stærri en húsið.
What does miklu mean here and why isn’t it just mikill?
miklu is the adverbial form of mikill (‘big, much’) and functions like English much in “much bigger.” In Icelandic, adverbs derived from adjectives often take a special ending (historically the neuter dative), so the adjective stem mikill becomes miklu when used to intensify a comparative.
Why is it stærri and not stærra?
Comparative adjectives in Icelandic agree with the gender and number of the noun they describe. Skólinn is masculine singular nominative, so its comparative form is stærri. Stærra would be the neuter form (e.g. for húsið).
Why are both skólinn and húsið in the nominative case?
The verb er (‘is’) is a copula, and its subject and predicate noun/adjective remain in the nominative. In constructions with en (‘than’), you compare two nominative noun phrases; no case shift occurs.
Can I use mun instead of miklu, as in “Skólinn er mun stærri en húsið”?