Breakdown of Hann hlýtur að hafa gleymt skrúfjárninu heima, því hann kom án verkfæra.
hann
he
heima
at home
hafa
to have
koma
to come
Questions & Answers about Hann hlýtur að hafa gleymt skrúfjárninu heima, því hann kom án verkfæra.
What does hlýtur mean here, and why is it in the present tense?
Hlýtur is the 3rd person singular present of hljóta. In this kind of sentence it expresses a strong logical conclusion: must / is bound to / surely (based on evidence). Icelandic often uses the present tense for this kind of deduction even though the event being deduced happened in the past (that’s handled by hafa gleymt, see below).
Why do we have að after hlýtur?
With hljóta meaning must (logically), Icelandic normally uses að + infinitive to introduce what you conclude:
- Hann hlýtur að vera veikur. = He must be sick. Here, the infinitive phrase is að hafa gleymt ....
Why is it hlýtur að hafa gleymt and not just hlýtur að gleyma?
að hafa gleymt is a perfect infinitive: it means the forgetting happened before the present moment (or before the moment you’re talking from).
- hlýtur að gleyma would mean must forget / must be forgetting (habitually or right now), which doesn’t fit the idea that the forgetting already occurred.
What grammar is going on in hafa gleymt?