Questions & Answers about Ég er bara þreyttur.
Bara is an adverb that most often translates as “just”, “only”, or “simply.”
In Ég er bara þreyttur, it usually:
- Downplays the situation: “I’m just tired (nothing more serious).”
- Can also sound a bit apologetic or explanatory: “The reason is only that I’m tired.”
So it doesn’t mainly mean “barely tired” but more “that’s all it is, I’m (just) tired.”
Yes, the ending changes with gender (and number, case) of the person or thing it describes.
Þreyttur is the masculine singular nominative form of the adjective þreyttur (“tired”).
- A man would normally say: Ég er bara þreyttur.
- A woman would normally say: Ég er bara þreytt. (feminine singular nominative)
- A neuter subject (like a neuter noun) would also use þreytt.
So the adjective agrees with the subject in gender, number, and case. Here the subject is Ég (I), so you pick the form that matches the speaker’s grammatical gender in Icelandic.
Grammatically, for a man, þreyttur is the “correct” form, so Ég er bara þreytt would normally be treated as a mistake in standard Icelandic.
- If a woman says Ég er bara þreytt, that is correct.
- If a man says Ég er bara þreytt, it sounds like non‑native grammar, or like he is deliberately using the feminine form (for example, for gender expression).
In everyday conversation people will still understand you perfectly, but if you want to sound correct, use þreyttur when referring to a male speaker.
Yes, bara is somewhat flexible, but the neutral, most common position is:
- Ég er bara þreyttur.
Other positions change the emphasis:
- Ég er þreyttur bara.
- Possible in speech.
- Feels like you’re adding bara as an afterthought: “I’m tired, that’s all.”
- Ég bara er þreyttur.
- Much less common.
- Puts strong emphasis on bara: “I just am tired (that’s the situation, like it or not).”
For clear, natural Icelandic, stick to Ég er bara þreyttur most of the time.
Approximate pronunciation (IPA and rough English hints):
- Ég → [jɛːɣ]
- Starts with a y sound (like yes).
- The g is a soft, voiced fricative [ɣ], made at the back of the mouth.
- er → [ɛr]
- Like “air” but shorter and with a tapped r.
- bara → [ˈpaːra]
- Stress on ba-.
- b as in bat, a long like “father”, rolled or tapped r.
- þreyttur → [ˈθreihtʏr] (roughly THRAYH-tir)
- þ = th in thing (never like this).
- ey = like “ay” in day.
- tt is pre‑aspirated: a little h-breath before t (h + t).
- Final -ur is short and reduced, like -ur in many Icelandic words: [ʏr].
Main stress falls on Ég, then ba- in bara, and þrey- in þreyttur.
Both are in the nominative case.
- Ég is the subject of the sentence, so it appears in nominative.
- With the verb vera (“to be”), the adjective describing the subject also takes the nominative, and agrees with the subject:
- Ég (nom.) er þreyttur (nom. masc. sg.).
So Ég er þreyttur is literally “I (nom.) am tired (nom.).”
The sentence itself is neutral, but bara is quite informal/colloquial in tone.
- In everyday speech, Ég er bara þreyttur is perfectly natural and very common.
- In more formal writing (e.g. official reports), you might leave out bara or use a different adverb:
- Ég er þreyttur.
- Ég er aðeins þreyttur. (“I’m a bit tired.”)
In spoken Icelandic, though, bara is used all the time.
Common options:
- Ég er bara smá þreyttur. (man)
- Ég er bara smá þreytt. (woman)
Other very natural colloquial choices for “a little”:
- Ég er bara pínu þreyttur / þreytt.
- Ég er bara örlítið þreyttur / þreytt.
All keep the same basic structure as Ég er bara þreyttur, just adding a word for “a little.”
The infinitive is vera (“to be”), and in the present tense it conjugates like this:
- ég er – I am
- þú ert – you are (singular, informal)
- hann er / hún er / það er – he / she / it is
- við erum – we are
- þið eruð – you are (plural)
- þeir eru / þær eru / þau eru – they are (masc. / fem. / neut.)
So Ég er bara þreyttur uses the first person singular form er.
Yes. Bara often means “only” in that sense:
- Ég er bara tíu ára. – I’m only ten years old.
- Hann á bara eitt barn. – He only has one child.
In Ég er bara þreyttur, the same word bara is used, but the nuance is more “just / simply” rather than a number or amount. The core idea is always limiting or downplaying something: “only this, nothing more.”