Jón fer til Maríu.

Breakdown of Jón fer til Maríu.

fara
to go
til
to
Jón
Jon
María
Maria

Questions & Answers about Jón fer til Maríu.

Why is Maria's name spelled Maríu here instead of María?
This is because of the preposition til (to), which forces the word following it into the genitive case. The genitive case is often used to show possession or destination. For most feminine names ending in -a like María, the genitive form changes the ending to -u.
The translation says "to Maria's". Can this also just mean he is walking up to her?
In Icelandic, going til a person strongly implies going to their home, much like saying "to Maria's place" in English. If Jon were just walking over to her on the street, you would typically use a different preposition like (towards).
The dictionary form of the verb "to go" is fara. Why is it fer here?
Fara is an irregular strong verb. In the present tense, the stem vowel a changes to e for singular subjects (I, you, he/she/it). Because Jón is a "he" (third person singular), the verb becomes fer.
If I want to say "Jon goes to the store," do I also use til?
Usually, no. While til is used for going to people's homes or traveling to countries, going to local places like a store, town, or building typically uses the prepositions í (in/into) or á (on/onto).

Learn Jón fer til Maríu and more in Icelandic

All course content and exercises are completely free — no paywalls, no trial periods, no signup needed.

  • Practice with interactive exercises
  • Track your progress with spaced repetition
  • Learn at your own pace — completely free