Icelandic

How to spell icelandic

9 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce icelandic

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does icelandic mean?

1. adjectiveRelating to Iceland, its people, or its language.
2. nounThe North Germanic language spoken in Iceland.

Icelandic in a sentence

• adjective

  The icelandic landscape is full of volcanoes and hot springs.

• noun

  He spent two years learning icelandic before moving to Reykjavik.

• adjective

  She ordered an icelandic lamb dish at the harbour restaurant.

• noun

  The saga was translated from old icelandic into English.

Where does icelandic come from?

Language of origin: Old Norse

This word is built from the place name Iceland plus the suffix -ic, which English uses to form adjectives meaning 'relating to'. Iceland itself comes from the Old Norse Ísland, a straightforward compound of íss, meaning 'ice', and land, meaning 'land', a name said to have been given by early Norse settlers in the ninth century. The -ic ending arrived in English largely through Latin -icus and Greek -ikos, both of which formed adjectives of belonging, and it became the standard English way to turn a country or region into an adjective. So the word reads almost transparently as 'of the ice land', and that visible 'ice' at the front is the helpful clue to the spelling. The trap is simply that the everyday word 'ice' loses its capital and slides into the longer form, so writers must keep the c-e of ice intact before land.

How the word is built

• ice
• land (from Old Norse Ísland: 'ice land')
• -ic (adjective/noun suffix denoting belonging or relating to)