Breakdown of Honum þykir áráttan sín skemmtileg.
hann
he
skemmtilegur
fun
sinn
his/her/their own (sinn, sína, sitt)
þykja
to find (have an opinion)
áráttan
the compulsion
Questions & Answers about Honum þykir áráttan sín skemmtileg.
Why do we use the reflexive sín here instead of hans, considering the subject honum is in the dative case?
Even though honum is in the dative case (a "quirky" subject), it still acts as the true grammatical subject of the sentence. In Icelandic, oblique subjects trigger the reflexive possessive word sinn (here as sín) just like regular nominative subjects do, to show that the subject owns the object.
Is sín actually in the nominative case here? I thought reflexives couldn't be nominative!
You are thinking of the standard reflexive pronoun sig/sér/sín, which lacks a nominative form. However, the possessive reflexive sinn (sinn/sín/sitt) absolutely can be in the nominative! Here, it is nominative feminine singular to agree with áráttan. This happens frequently with verbs like þykja, which take a dative subject but a nominative object.
Why does the noun have the definite article (áráttan) if it's already modified by the possessive sín?
In Icelandic, when a possessive pronoun (like sín, minn, or þinn) comes directly after the noun it modifies, the noun must take the definite article. So we say áráttan sín (literally "the-compulsion his"). If the possessive was placed before the noun for emphasis, the article would drop: sín árátta.
Why is the adjective skemmtileg in the nominative form rather than matching the dative subject?
Because skemmtileg is describing the compulsion (áráttan), not the person. Since the verb þykja assigns the nominative case to the thing being evaluated (the object/complement), the adjective must be in the nominative feminine singular to match áráttan.
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