Breakdown of Maginn minn er ekki vanur að melta kjöt.
vera
to be
ekki
not
að
to (infinitive marker)
minn
my
kjötið
the meat
maginn
the stomach
vanur
used to
melta
to digest
Questions & Answers about Maginn minn er ekki vanur að melta kjöt.
How does the adjective vanur agree with the subject in this sentence?
Since vanur acts as an adjective here, it must agree with the subject in gender, number, and case. Because maginn (the stomach) is a masculine noun in the singular nominative case, the adjective takes the masculine singular nominative form vanur. If the subject were feminine, it would be vön.
Why is vanur followed by að here, and what happens if I want to say I am used to a noun instead of an action?
To express being used to an action, you use vanur + að + the infinitive verb, which is að melta (to digest) in this sentence. If you wanted to say your stomach is used to a specific thing (a noun), you would drop the að and put the noun in the dative case. For example, maginn minn er ekki vanur þessum mat (my stomach is not used to this food).
Why does the sentence use maginn minn (the stomach mine) instead of just minn magi?
When talking about body parts or family members, Icelandic strongly prefers attaching the definite article to the noun and placing the possessive pronoun afterward. Magi becomes the definite maginn (the stomach), followed by minn (my).
What grammatical case is kjöt in here?
It is in the accusative case, because it is the direct object of the verb melta (to digest). Kjöt (meat) is a neuter noun, and its accusative form is identical to its nominative form, which is why the word looks unchanged.
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