Learn Icelandic: Snjórinn er fallegur en það er kalt. - The snow is beautiful but it is cold.

In Icelandic, when you talk about the weather or general conditions, you use the dummy subject það (it), just like in English. Even though we were just talking about the snow, saying það er kalt refers to the general temperature outside, not the snow itself.

Why is the adjective fallegur used instead of fallegt?

Adjectives in Icelandic change their endings to match the gender of the noun they describe. The word for snow, snjór, is a masculine noun. Therefore, the adjective must take the masculine form fallegur (beautiful).

If snow is masculine, why does the second half use kalt (the neuter form of cold)?

Because kalt isn't describing the snow directly. It is describing the dummy subject það, which is a neuter pronoun. When making general statements about the weather like "it is cold", the adjective always takes the default neuter form to match það.

How does the word snjórinn break down to mean "the snow"?

In Icelandic, the word for "the" (the definite article) is not a separate word before the noun. Instead, it is attached to the end of the word. Snjór means "snow", and adding the masculine ending -inn turns it into snjórinn (the snow).