Imperative
The imperative mood🇮🇸 boðháttur in Icelandic is used to give 🫵 instructions or orders:
Réttu mér saltið!
Hættið þessu strax krakkar!
Kom inn!
Formation
As Icelandic verb conjugations go, the imperative is pretty much the simplest there is. It has 3 forms:
- 🐻 bare infinitive, barely (pardon the pun) used at all in modern Icelandic,
- 👤 singular, used when talking to one person,
- 👥 plural, used when talking to more than one person.
The bare infinitive is formed by chopping the infinitive -a ending off the verb. Simple as that (almost, there are a tiny handful of exceptions, see below).
In group 1 weak verbs, the -a is part of the stem, so we keep it in the imperative too.
To form the singular imperative, add -ðu to the bare infinitive. In all verb groups apart from group 1 weak, the ð in the ending might change to d, dd or t depending on the consonant that comes before it. The rules for this are the same as for the past tense of group 2 and 3 weak verbs. See dental suffixes for all the rules.
To form the plural imperative, add -ið to the bare infinitive. This is nice and regular.
Let’s look at some examples:
| Verb group | Infinitive | Bare imperative | Singular | Plural |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Weak group 1 | að tala að hjálpa að elda | tala hjálpa elda | talaðu hjálpaðu eldaðu | talið hjálpið eldið |
| Weak group 2 | að gera að heyra að renna að senda að steikja | ger heyr renn send steik | gerðu heyrðu renndu sendu steiktu | gerið heyrið rennið sendið steikið |
| Weak group 3/ strong verbs | að velja að flytja að fara að koma að bjóða að þvo | vel flyt far kom bjóð þvo | veldu flyttu farðu komdu bjóddu þvoðu | veljið flytjið farið komið bjóðið þvoið |
The imperative can also be combined with the middle voice:
| Middle voice infinitive | Singular | Plural |
|---|---|---|
| að gefast að setjast | gefstu sestu | gefist setjist |
Middle voice imperatives do not have bare forms.
Irregular imperative
There are a couple of verbs in Icelandic that have an irregular imperative stem, which tends to show up only in the bare and singular forms:
| Infinitive | Bare imperative | Singular | Plural |
|---|---|---|---|
| að binda | bind | bittu | bindið |
| að ganga | gakk | gakktu | gangið |
| að standa | statt | stattu | standið |
| að vera | ver/vert | vertu | verið |
| að þegja | þegi/þeg | þegiðu | þegið |
You may also hear the forms keyptu and spurðu, as opposed to the expected kauptu and spyrðu, for að kaupa and að spyrja respectively. These aren’t officially acknowledged as correct forms, but are nonetheless super common.
Usage
Bare infinitive
Although common in Old Norse, the bare infinitive is very rarely used in modern, idiomatic Icelandic. One of the few exceptions is:
Kom inn!
This is used when we don’t know how many people are on the other side of a closed door. In other contexts, the bare infintive carries a formal or archaic connotation.
Positive instructions
The singular and plural forms of the imperative are used to give direct instructions to take a particular action:
Sendu mér heimilisfangið.
Hringdu í hann núna.
Keyrðu í búðina og kauptu mjólkurfernu.
Although not as brusque as in some other languages, the imperative, particularly in its singular form, is a direct way of telling somebody to do something. If you want to be more polite, you can use a question with vilja or geta (and show even more politeness with the subjunctive):
Viltu loka glugganum?
Geturðu millifært á mig peningana?
Gætirðu reimað skóna mína?
Negative instructions
When we want to give a negative command in Icelandic, a common way is to use ekki followed by the infinitive:
Ekki sulla drykknum á borðið elskan!
Ekki kasta steinum að fuglum!
Ekki snerta kökuna!
We can also use the imperative followed by ekki, which is a bit stronger:
Láttu ekki svona!
Idiomatic expressions
The imperative is found in quite a few idiomatic expressions where the usage might not follow the rules above.
Heyrðu is commonly used as a conversational interjection, meaning something like “right” or “look”. It doesn’t have an annoyed undertone like the English “listen!”.
Afsakið meaning “excuse me” is a plural imperative, used even when talking to exactly one person. This usage stems from the days of þérun, when the polite 2nd person pronoun þér was still in common use. This verb form used the plural endings, and so it followed that afsakið would be plural too. Although þérun is long dead, afsakið continues to be used as a polite hangover.
Recipes
🍳 Recipes are often written in the plural imperative:
Bætið mjólkinni út í og hrærið vel.
This is another relic from the days of þérun but lives on as a convention in contemporary Icelandic.
gjöra
The commonly used phrase gjörðu svo vel and others derived from it show an older from of the verb gera, instead of the expected gerðu:
Gjörðu svo vel að kveikja á ljósinu!
Gjörið svo vel að fá ykkur sæti!
This phrase is akin to “feel free”, “go ahead” or “please” in English.