Breakdown of Ég vildi brjóta kóðann en hann er torráðinn.
vera
to be
ég
I
hann
he
en
but
vilja
to want (to will, be willing)
brjóta
to break
kóðinn
the code
torráðinn
hard to decipher
Questions & Answers about Ég vildi brjóta kóðann en hann er torráðinn.
How is torráðinn formed, and what does the base verb mean here?
It is built from the prefix tor- (meaning hard to or with difficulty) and ráðinn, the past participle of the verb ráða. While ráða frequently means to advise or hire, in the context of codes or puzzles, it means to solve or decipher.
If the code were easy to break, what would be the exact opposite of torráðinn?
Why does the second half of the sentence use hann (he) to mean 'it'?
In Icelandic, pronouns must agree with the grammatical gender of the noun they replace. The word for code, kóði, is a masculine noun. Therefore, you must use the masculine pronoun hann to refer back to it, rather than the neuter pronoun það.
Why does torráðinn end in -inn in this sentence?
Because it functions as an adjective describing hann (the masculine code), it must agree in gender, number, and case. Since hann is the subject of the second clause, it is in the nominative case. torráðinn is the correct masculine singular nominative form of this past participle.
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