Breakdown of Gólfborðið skemmdist, en slasaðist nokkur?
en
but
skemmast
to get damaged
slasast
to get injured
nokkur
anybody / any
gólfborðið
the floorboard
Questions & Answers about Gólfborðið skemmdist, en slasaðist nokkur?
Why is nokkur used here to mean "anybody", and what gender is it?
In questions and negative sentences, nokkur acts as a standalone pronoun meaning "anybody" or "anyone". It is in the masculine singular nominative form here, which is the standard default in Icelandic when referring to an unknown person.
Both verbs end in -st (skemmdist, slasaðist). What does this ending do here?
This is the middle voice suffix. The active verb skemma means "to damage [something]", but adding -st creates skemmdist ("got damaged"). Similarly, slasa is "to injure [someone]", so slasaðist means "got injured". This ending is a common way to express that something happened to the subject without using a full passive voice construction.
Why is the verb slasaðist before the subject nokkur in the second part of the sentence?
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