Learn Hardcore Icelandic: Foreldrarnir eru gift hjón.

Hjón by itself can mean a married couple or (the) married couples, depending on context.
If you want the married couple, you add the definite ending and say hjónin.

So gift hjón naturally corresponds to English a married couple, even though there’s no separate word for a.

What exactly does Foreldrarnir mean, and why does it end in -nir?

The base word is:

foreldri = parent (singular)
foreldrar = parents (plural, nominative, indefinite)

Icelandic marks definiteness with a suffix, not a separate word:

foreldrar = parents
foreldrarnir = the parents

The -nir at the end is the definite nominative plural ending for many masculine plural nouns. So Foreldrarnir literally means the parents (as the subject).

Why is it eru and not er?

Eru is the plural form of vera (to be):

ég er – I am
þú ert – you (sg.) are
hann/hún/það er – he/she/it is
við erum – we are
þið eruð – you (pl.) are
þeir/þær/þau eru – they are

Since Foreldrarnir (the parents) is plural, the verb must also be plural: Foreldrarnir eru … not Foreldrarnir er …

Why is the adjective gift and not giftir, gifta, or something else?

The adjective giftur (married) declines for gender and number:

Nominative singular:
- masculine: giftur
- feminine: gift
- neuter: gift
Nominative plural:
- masculine: giftir
- feminine: gifta
- neuter: gift

In gift hjón, the adjective agrees with hjón, not with Foreldrarnir.
Hjón is neuter plural, so the correct form of the adjective is gift (neuter plural). Hence gift hjón.

What is hjón exactly? Is it singular or plural?

Hjón is a bit special:

It is grammatically neuter plural.
It refers to one married couple (two people together).
There is no singular form; it is plurale tantum (a noun that only exists in the plural), like scissors in English.

So:

hjón = a married couple
hjónin = the married couple
Foreldrarnir eru gift hjón = The parents are a married couple (lit. “the parents are married couple [pl.]”)

If Foreldrarnir is the subject, why does gift agree with hjón and not with Foreldrarnir?

In this sentence, the structure is:

Foreldrarnir – subject
eru – verb
gift hjón – noun phrase functioning as the subject complement (what they “are”)

Within the noun phrase gift hjón, the adjective gift is attributive, directly modifying hjón:

adjective (gift) + noun (hjón)

Because hjón is neuter plural, the adjective takes the neuter plural form gift. The agreement is inside the phrase gift hjón, not with the subject Foreldrarnir.

If you said:

Foreldrarnir eru giftir.

then giftir would be a predicate adjective and would agree directly with Foreldrarnir (masculine plural).

Could I say Foreldrarnir eru giftir instead? What is the difference?

Yes, you can, and it’s perfectly natural:

Foreldrarnir eru giftir.
= The parents are married.
Here, giftir is a predicate adjective agreeing with Foreldrarnir (masc. plural).
Foreldrarnir eru gift hjón.
= The parents are a married couple.
Here, gift hjón is a noun phrase (a married couple), and gift agrees with hjón (neuter plural).

So:

… eru giftir → focus on their marital status.
… eru gift hjón → explicitly states that they form a married couple with each other.

Does hjón already mean “married couple”? Isn’t gift hjón redundant?

Yes, hjón by itself already means married couple. So in a strict sense, gift hjón is somewhat redundant.

However:

gift hjón is a very common collocation, and it sounds quite natural.
It can feel a bit emphatic or explicit, underlining that they really are married, not just a couple living together.

You can also simply say:

Foreldrarnir eru hjón.
This also means the parents are a married couple and is absolutely fine.

Which case are the nouns and adjective in, and why?

The forms in the sentence are all nominative:

Foreldrarnir – nominative plural definite (subject)
gift – nominative neuter plural (adjective agreeing with hjón)
hjón – nominative neuter plural (subject complement)

In Icelandic, a subject complement after vera (to be) normally takes the nominative case, just like the subject. That is why hjón is in the nominative, not accusative or any other case.

Why is hjón neuter when it refers to a man and a woman?

In Icelandic, grammatical gender and natural gender do not always match:

Hjón is grammatically neuter plural by convention, regardless of the actual sexes of the people.
The word itself doesn’t change if the couple is man–woman, woman–woman, man–man, etc.; it always stays neuter plural.

This is similar to some other Icelandic nouns whose grammatical gender is fixed and not determined by biological sex.

How would I say the married couple instead of a married couple?

You make the noun definite by adding a definite ending:

gift hjón = a married couple
giftu hjónin = the married couple

Notice two changes:

hjón → hjónin (definite neuter plural: the couple)
gift → giftu – the adjective now agrees with a definite noun, which usually triggers a different (often called “weak”) declension pattern: giftu hjónin.

So:

Foreldrarnir eru gift hjón. – The parents are a married couple.
Foreldrarnir eru giftu hjónin. – The parents are the married couple.

How is Foreldrarnir pronounced? That cluster of consonants looks difficult.

Approximate pronunciation (in IPA and a rough English-style guide):

Foreldrarnir: [ˈfɔːrɛltrar.nɪr]

Very roughly:

fo – like fo in foreign, but with a longer o
reld – something like relt, with the d very light or almost disappearing
rarnir – rar-nir, with a tapped r (like a quick Spanish r in pero)

Two tips:

Put main stress on the first syllable: FO-rel-drarn-ir.
Don’t try to pronounce every consonant separately; in natural Icelandic speech, some are blended, so it flows more smoothly than it looks in writing.