Breakdown of Er vinstri skórinn þinn?
vera
to be
þinn
your (m, f, n: þinn, þín, þitt)
skórinn
the shoe
vinstri
left
Questions & Answers about Er vinstri skórinn þinn?
If I wanted to ask 'Which shoe is yours?' instead of just asking about the left one, would I use hvor or hver?
You would use hvor. Because shoes naturally come in pairs, you are asking 'which of the two' shoes. You would say Hvor skórinn er þinn? If you were asking someone to pick a shoe out of a large pile of three or more, you would use hver.
Why doesn't the adjective vinstri have a masculine ending to match skórinn?
The Icelandic words for 'left' (vinstri) and 'right' (hægri) are indeclinable. This means they are frozen in this form and never change their endings, no matter the gender, number, or case of the noun they describe.
Why does the sentence say skórinn þinn ('the shoe yours') instead of þinn skór?
In Icelandic, the most natural and common way to show possession is to put the noun with the 'the' ending first, followed by the possessive word. You only put the possessive word first (þinn skór) if you want to put strong emphasis on it, like saying 'Is this YOUR shoe?'
The root word for shoe is skór. Why does it take the full -inn ending for 'the'?
Skór is a masculine noun. Unlike words like hestur where the -ur is a grammar ending that drops off before adding the article, the -r in skór is part of the core word itself. It takes the standard masculine 'the' ending -inn, making it skórinn.
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