Questions & Answers about Húfan hennar er bleik og hanskarnir eru brúnir.
Húfa is the basic dictionary form and means a hat / cap.
Icelandic usually marks “the” by adding an ending to the noun instead of using a separate word:
- húfa = a hat
- húfan = the hat
So -n on the end is the definite article in this case (feminine singular nominative). The sentence is talking about a specific hat, so it uses húfan.
In English the normal order is her hat (possessive + noun).
In Icelandic, the most typical neutral order is noun + possessive:
- húfan hennar = her hat
- bíll hans = his car
So húfan hennar is literally “the hat her”, but that is simply how Icelandic usually expresses possession in this kind of phrase.
You can put the possessive pronoun before the noun (e.g. hennar húfa), but that tends to sound emphatic or contrastive, more like “her hat (as opposed to someone else’s)”. The basic, non‑emphatic way is húfan hennar.