Breakdown of Stærsta íbúðin er í besta hverfinu.
vera
to be
í
in / into / to (before the hour, in telling time) / per (in frequency expressions)
íbúðin
the apartment
bestur
best
stærstur
biggest
hverfið
the neighborhood
Questions & Answers about Stærsta íbúðin er í besta hverfinu.
Why do we use stærsta instead of the basic superlative form stærst?
Because the noun it describes, íbúðin (the apartment), has the definite article attached to it. When an adjective goes with a definite noun, it must use the weak declension. For a feminine noun in the nominative case, the weak superlative ending is -a.
Does besta end in -a for the exact same reason?
Yes, it is also paired with a definite noun, hverfinu (the neighborhood). However, the grammar behind it is slightly different. The word hverfi is a neuter noun, and here it is in the dative case. Luckily, the weak superlative ending for a neuter dative noun is also -a, so the pattern looks the same!
Why is the word for neighborhood in the dative case (hverfinu) here?
The preposition í (in) controls the case of the noun that follows it. When í describes a stationary location (where something is currently located), it requires the dative case. If it described movement into a place, it would take the accusative case instead.
How can I tell the gender of íbúðin from this sentence?
You can tell it is a feminine noun by looking at its definite article ending -in. If it were a masculine noun, the definite form would usually end in -inn (like hesturinn), and if it were neuter, it would end in -ið (before changing cases).
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