Breakdown of Hetjan fór til jötunsins þegar bardaginn hafði byrjað.
fara
to go
byrja
to start
til
to
hafa
to have
þegar
when
jötunninn
the giant
hetjan
the hero
bardaginn
the battle
Questions & Answers about Hetjan fór til jötunsins þegar bardaginn hafði byrjað.
How is the past perfect tense formed in the phrase hafði byrjað?
Just like in English, it combines the past tense of the helper verb hafa (to have) with the supine form of the main verb. Here, we use hafði (had) and byrjað (started). It is used to make it clear that the battle started before the other past action of the hero leaving.
Why doesn't the verb form byrjað change to match the masculine noun bardaginn?
Because it is acting as the supine (sagnbót) in a perfect tense, not as an adjective describing the noun. Whenever a verb directly follows a form of hafa to create the perfect or past perfect tense, it takes this fixed form ending in -ð or -t and never changes, regardless of the subject's gender or number.
Why is the word for "the giant" written as jötunsins instead of just jötunninn?
The preposition til always forces the following noun into the genitive case. The base word is jötunn (giant). In the genitive case, it becomes jötuns. When you add the definite article suffix to mean "the" giant, it becomes jötunsins.
Could I use hvenær instead of þegar for the word "when" in this sentence?
No, you must use þegar here. hvenær is strictly a question word used when asking for a time (like "When did it start?"). þegar is a conjunction used to connect two events in a normal statement, meaning "at the time that" something happened.
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