Breakdown of Jón var fyrsti gesturinn hérna.
vera
to be
gesturinn
the guest (m)
Jón
Jon
hérna
here (colloquial, pointing)
Questions & Answers about Jón var fyrsti gesturinn hérna.
Why is it fyrsti and not just fyrst?
Ordinal numbers act like adjectives, so they must match the noun they describe in gender, number, and case. Because gestur (guest) is a masculine singular noun in the nominative case, we use the masculine nominative form fyrsti.
English uses a separate word for the in the first guest. Why is the the attached to the end of gesturinn here?
When you use an ordinal number in Icelandic, the noun that follows it almost always takes the attached definite article. So instead of using a separate word for the, you just attach -inn to gestur to make gesturinn (the guest), giving us fyrsti gesturinn.
Since fyrsti describes a definite noun, is it using a weak adjective ending?
Exactly! Ordinal numbers in Icelandic always use weak adjective endings (except for annar, which means second). Because an ordinal number points out a specific, definite thing in a sequence, it takes the weak masculine nominative ending -i, giving us fyrsti.
We previously learned that hér means here. What is the difference between hér and hérna?
Both mean here and are used to talk about location. Hérna is simply a slightly more conversational or informal version of hér. You will hear hérna very often in everyday spoken Icelandic, and they are completely interchangeable in a sentence like this.