Questions & Answers about Þau tala íslensku heima.
Þau is the neuter plural pronoun meaning “they.”
Icelandic has three different “they” forms:
- þeir – “they” for a group that is all male (masculine plural)
- þær – “they” for a group that is all female (feminine plural)
- þau – “they” for a mixed group or a group of things / neutrals (neuter plural)
So Þau tala íslensku heima usually suggests either:
- a mixed‑gender group of people, or
- a group where gender is not being specified or is irrelevant.
Þ represents the unvoiced th sound as in think.
Approximate pronunciation of Þau:
- Þ – like th in thing
- au – a diphthong, roughly like English oi in boil, but with Icelandic flavour
So Þau sounds somewhat like “thoi”, but with a shorter, tighter vowel.
Tala is the present tense, 1st and 3rd person plural form of the verb að tala (to speak).
Present tense forms are:
- ég tala – I speak
- þú talar – you (singular) speak
- hann / hún / það talar – he / she / it speaks
- við tölum – we speak
- þið talið – you (plural) speak
- þeir / þær / þau tala – they speak
Since the subject is Þau (they), the correct form is tala.
No. Icelandic is not a “null‑subject” language in the same way Spanish or Italian are.
You generally must include the subject pronoun:
- Þau tala íslensku heima. – correct
- *Tala íslensku heima. – sounds wrong or incomplete in normal speech
There are some special impersonal constructions where the subject is not expressed, but in a normal sentence like this one, you keep the pronoun.
Íslenska is a feminine noun meaning “Icelandic (language).”
Its singular forms are roughly:
- Nominative: íslenska
- Accusative: íslensku
- Dative: íslensku
- Genitive: íslensku
After tala (to speak) with a language name as an object, Icelandic normally uses the accusative, so you say:
- tala íslensku – speak Icelandic
Using íslenska here would be a nominative form and is not standard in this construction.
In this sentence, íslensku is a noun meaning “Icelandic (the language).”
There is also an adjective íslenskur, íslensk, íslenskt meaning “Icelandic” (e.g. Icelandic man, Icelandic food), but that is not what is used here.
So:
- íslenska (íslensku) – the language (noun)
- íslenskur / íslensk / íslenskt – Icelandic as an adjective
Language names in Icelandic are normally used without any article in this kind of construction.
You say:
- Þau tala íslensku. – They speak Icelandic.
You would not normally say something like *tala tungumálið íslensku (speak the Icelandic language) unless you have a very specific, unusual context. In everyday speech, the bare language name is used.
Both are common, but there is a nuance:
tala íslensku – literally “speak Icelandic”
- Focus on knowing/using the language
- Very common when talking about what languages someone speaks
tala á íslensku – literally “speak in Icelandic”
- Slightly more focus on the medium of communication in a given situation
- Common when contrasting languages or talking about how something is said
In many everyday situations, they are close in meaning and both acceptable:
- Þau tala íslensku heima.
- Þau tala á íslensku heima.
Both can be heard, though tala íslensku is very standard.
Heima is an adverb meaning “at home.”
Because it is an adverb, it already contains the “at” meaning inside it, so you do not add a preposition:
- Ég er heima. – I am at home.
- Þau tala íslensku heima. – They speak Icelandic at home.
You do not say *á heima in standard Icelandic.
They express location vs direction:
heima – “at home” (location, where?)
- Ég er heima. – I am at home.
- Þau tala íslensku heima. – They speak Icelandic at home.
heim – “home” (direction, to where?)
- Ég fer heim. – I am going home.
- Hann keyrir heim. – He drives home.
So in this sentence, you need heima, because it describes where they are when they speak.
Icelandic word order is relatively flexible, but not all orders sound equally natural.
Neutral, most natural order here:
- Þau tala íslensku heima.
Other possibilities:
- Heima tala þau íslensku. – Also possible; begins with the place for emphasis: “At home, they speak Icelandic.”
But:
- *Þau tala heima íslensku. – Feels wrong/awkward; heima normally comes at the end or near the beginning, not between verb and object here.
Safe rule for learners:
- Keep subject – verb – object – place as in the original sentence, unless you have learned specifically how to front adverbs for emphasis.
Negation:
- Þau tala ekki íslensku heima.
- ekki is the normal word for “not.”
- It usually comes after the finite verb (tala) and before the object (íslensku).
“Only” (in the sense of “exclusively”):
- Þau tala bara íslensku heima.
- Þau tala eingöngu íslensku heima. (more formal / stronger)
Word order stays similar; you simply insert ekki, bara, or eingöngu after tala and before íslensku.