Breakdown of Forritarinn kláraði uppsetninguna á fjórum dögum.
fjórir
four
klára
to finish
dagurinn
the day (m)
á
in (within a time span)
forritarinn
the programmer
uppsetningin
the setup
Questions & Answers about Forritarinn kláraði uppsetninguna á fjórum dögum.
Why do we use á here to mean in, and why is it followed by the dative case?
In Icelandic, to express how long it takes to complete an action (like finishing a setup), you use á followed by the dative case (á fjórum dögum). If you wanted to say how long an ongoing action lasted without necessarily completing it, you would use í followed by the accusative case (í fjóra daga).
I know the word for four is fjórir. Why does it change to fjórum here?
The numbers 1 to 4 decline in Icelandic to match the gender and case of the noun they describe. Because the preposition á triggers the dative case for completion time, both the number and the noun must be in the dative plural. The dative plural for four is fjórum (for all genders), which perfectly matches the dative plural noun dögum.
Why does the word uppsetninguna end in -una?
The base word is uppsetning (setup), which is a feminine noun. Because it is the direct object of the verb kláraði (finished), it needs to be in the accusative case. For feminine nouns ending in -ing, the definite article (the) in the accusative case is -una, resulting in uppsetninguna.
How does the word forritarinn break down?
The base noun is forritari (programmer), which is built from forrit (computer program). The word forrit literally means pre-writing (from for- + rit). The -ari suffix makes it a profession, much like -er in English. Finally, we add the masculine definite article -nn to make it forritarinn (the programmer).
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