Breakdown of Við hræðumst kuldann þegar okkur er mjög kalt.
vera
to be
við
we
mjög
very
okkur
us
hræðast
to fear
kaldur
cold
þegar
when
kuldinn
the cold
Questions & Answers about Við hræðumst kuldann þegar okkur er mjög kalt.
Why do we say okkur er instead of við erum for 'we are'?
In Icelandic, expressing how you feel regarding temperature uses an impersonal construction. Instead of saying 'we are cold' (við erum köld - which actually means your body is physically cold to the touch), you say 'to us is cold' (okkur er kalt). That is why we use the dative pronoun okkur.
Why is the verb er used instead of erum, and why is the adjective kalt neuter?
Because this is an impersonal phrase ('to us is cold'), there is no nominative subject doing the action. Without a normal subject, the verb always defaults to the 3rd person singular (er) and the adjective defaults to the neuter singular form (kalt), regardless of who is feeling cold!
Why does hræðumst end in -st?
The -st ending shows that this is a middle voice verb. The base verb hræða means 'to scare' or 'to frighten', but adding the -st makes it hræðast (to be scared of / to fear). Since the subject is við (we), the verb conjugates to hræðumst.
What is the difference between kuldann and kalt in this sentence?
Even though they translate to the same English word, they are different parts of speech. Kuldann is a noun meaning 'the cold' (from the masculine noun kuldi with the definite article -nn attached). Kalt is an adjective describing the feeling of being cold (the neuter form of kaldur).
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