Breakdown of Hvort tókstu nautakjötið eða svínakjötið af hlaðborðinu?
þú
you
taka
to take
af
off
eða
or
hvort
whether
hlaðborðið
the buffet
nautakjötið
the beef
svínakjötið
the pork
Questions & Answers about Hvort tókstu nautakjötið eða svínakjötið af hlaðborðinu?
Why does this sentence start with Hvort when the English translation just says 'Did you'?
In Icelandic, when asking a main-clause question that offers a direct choice between two alternatives, it is standard to start with Hvort. It acts as a marker meaning 'which of the two'. While you could grammatically just ask Tókstu nautakjötið eða svínakjötið, starting with Hvort is much more idiomatic and immediately signals to the listener that they are being given an either/or choice.
Since kjöt is a neuter noun, is that why we are using the neuter form Hvort?
Actually, no! In this specific structure (alternative questions with eða), hvort acts as an uninflected question particle. It does not change its form to match the gender or number of the nouns being offered as choices. It will always be Hvort, even if you were asking about masculine or feminine nouns.
Why use af here instead of frá for 'from'?
While both prepositions translate to 'from', af specifically means taking something 'off' of a surface. Because a buffet is a table (a flat surface), you take food off of it. Frá is used more for movement away from a point of origin or a person. Both af and frá govern the dative case, which is why we see the dative form hlaðborðinu.
What are the root words that make up hlaðborðinu (the buffet)?
It is a compound of the verb að hlaða (to load, stack, or pile up) and the noun borð (table). So a buffet in Icelandic is quite literally a 'loaded table'. The suffix -inu at the end is the dative singular definite article attached to it.
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