An Introduction To Modern Faroese

An
INTRODUCTION
TO MODERN
FAROESE
BY
W. B. LOCKWOOD
4. Printing
FØROYA SKÚLABÓKAGRUNNUR
W. B. Lockwood:
An Introduction to Modern Faroese.
Skanning: Repro-Z.
Prent: Bookpartner.
4. útgáva, óbroytt.
Føroya Skúlabókagrunnur, Tórshavn 2002.
ISBN 99918-0-295-9
CONTENTS
PREFACE.
PRONUNCIATION.
GRAMMAR Page
Introductory....................................................................................................... 5
Alphabet § 1 ...................................................................................................... 6
Description of Faroese Sounds. Stress § 2 ........................................................ 6
Short and Long VoweI Quantities § 3............................................................... 8
Vowels and Diphthongs in Detail § 4................................................................ 9
Consonants in Detail § 5 ................................................................................... 14
Alternative Pronunciation of p, t, k ete. § 6....................................................... 22
Omission of Consonants and Assimilation § 7.................................................. 23
Changes in Connected Speech § 8 .................................................................... 24
Intonation § 9 .................................................................................................... 25
INFLEXIONS.
Nouns.
Declension of Nouns - Introductory § 10 .......................................................... 28
„ Masculine Nouns §§ 11-14........................................................ 28
„ Feminine Nouns §§ 15-19 ......................................................... 33
„ Neuter Nouns §§ 20-22 .............................................................. 36
Place Names § 23............................................................................................... 38
Formation of Compound Nouns § 24................................................................. 39
„ „ Nouns. Miscellaneous, § 25........................................................ 41
Nouns with the Suffix Definite Article § 26-26a ............................................... 42
Adjectives.
Strong Declension of Adjectives §§ 27-30 ....................................................... 46
Weak „ „ „ § 31 .......................................................... 50
Indeclinable Adjectives § 32-32a...................................................................... 50
Comparison of Adjectives §§ 33-35 ................................................................. 51
Adverbs.
Derivation of Adverbs from Adjectives § 36 .................................................... 53
Adverbs of Time, Degree & Manner, Affirmation & Negation §§ 37-39 54
„ Place denoting Rest at §§ 40-49 .................................................... 57
„ „ „ „ Motiontowards§§50-52 ............................. ........ 60
» „ „ „ „ from§§53-55........................................ 61
Comparison of Adverbs §§ 56-57 ..................................................................... 62
An introduction to… 22/08/02 13:10 Page 10
X
Numerals. Page
Cardinals §§ 58-59............................................................................................. 64
Ordinals § 60...................................................................................................... 66
Dates § 61 .......................................................................................................... 67
Other Numerate § 62.......................................................................................... 67
Telling the Time § 63......................................................................................... 69
Pronouns.
Personal § 64...................................................................................................... 70
Possessive § 65 .................................................................................................. 71
Demonstrative §§ 66-67 ..................................................................................... 71
Interrogative § 68 .............................................................................................. 72
Relative § 69 ..................................................................................................... 72
Indefinite § 70 .................................................................................................... 72
Verbs.
Introductory § 71............................................................................................... 73
Auxiliary Verbs vera, hava, verða, §§ 72-76 .................................................... 74
Modal Auxiliaries § 77...................................................................................... 75
Main Verbs § 78 ................................................................................................ 76
Weak Verbs, General § 79................................................................................. 76
„ Class 1 § 80.............................................................................. 76
„ Cla ss 2 § 8 1 ......................................................................... 77
„ Class 3 § 82............................................................................... 79
„ Class 4 § 83 .............................................................................. 80
Strong Verbs, General § 84 ............................................................................... 81
„ . „ Class 1 § 85 ............................................................................ 82
„ 2 § 86........................................................................... 82
„ 3 § 87 - 88 .................................................................... 82
„ 4 § 89........................................................................... 83
Reflexive Forms § 90 ........................................................................................ 84
OTHER PARTS OF SPEECH.

Conjunctions.
Co-ordinating § 91............................................................................................. 85
Subordinating § 92 ............................................................................................ 86
Prepositions.
General § 93 ...................................................................................................... 90
Prepositions governing the Accusative §§ 94-96............................................... 90
&Genitive§97 .............................. 91
„ Dative § 98........................................................ 93
,, „ „ Accusative &Dative § 99 ................................... 94
Prepositions before Place Names §§ 100-101 ................................................... 97
Prepositions in Combination with Adverbs & the Adverbial Use of
Prepositions §§ 102-106............................................................................ 97
Interjections § 107 ............................................................................................. 101
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XI
SYNTAX. _
Page
Collective Use of Nouns § 108 .......................................................................... 102
Use of the Cases §§ 109-113.............................................................................. 102
Definite Article §§ 114-116 ............................................................................... 106
Indefinite Article § 117...................................................................................... 109
Strong Adjectives §§ 118-120 ........................................................................... 110
Weak Adjectives § 121 ...................................................................................... 111
Indeclinable Adjectives § 122............................................................................ 112
Comparative & Superlative §§ 123-124 ............................................................ 113
Numerals in a Partitive Sense § 124a................................................................. 114
Pronouns,
Personal §§ 125-126 .......................................................................................... 114
Possessive § 127 ................................................................................................ 116
Reflexive Use § 127a ......................................................................................... 117
Demonstrative § 128.......................................................................................... 119
Interrogative § 129............................................................................................. 121
Relative § 130 .................................................................................................... 121
Indefinite § 131.................................................................................................. 123
Verbs.
Use of Tenses § 132 ........................................................................................... 130
Use of vera as an Auxiliary Verb § 133...................... ,..................................... 133
Passive Voice § 134 ........................................................................................... 134
Use of Verbs with the Termination -st § 135 ..................................................... 135
Verbs with the Reflexive Pronoun § 136 ........................................................... 136
Impersonal Verbs § 137 ..................................................................................... 136
Optative Mood § 138 ......................................................................................... 137
Imperative Mood § 139...................................................................................... 138
Infinitive Mood § 140 ........................................................................................ 138
Present Participle § 141 .................................................................................... 139
Past Participle § 142........................................................................................... 140
Supine § 143 ...................................................................................................... 141
Verbs compounded with Adverbs § 144 ............................................................ 143
The Auxiliary Verb eiga § 145 ................................................................... 144
„ ,, „ kunna § 146 .............................................................. . . 145
„ mega §147 ................................................................ 146
„ „ ,, munna § 148 ................................................................. 147
„ skula § 149................................................................. 148
„ vilja §150 .................................................................. 150
„ „ ,, lata §151 ................................................................... 151
Verbs expressing Inchoative Action § 152......................................................... 151
How to render English "can" § 153.................................................................... 152
Concord § 154.................................................................................................... 152
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Word Order. Page
Normal and Inverted Word Order § 155............................................................. 153
Word Order in Relative Clauses § 156 ............................................................... 155
Position of Adverbs § 157 .................................................................................. 156
Incapsulation § 158............................................................................................. 157
READER.
Conversation Piece, Faroese and English ........................................................... 158

Prose Selections ................................................................................................. 168
Verse Selections ................................................................................................. 188
FAROESE GLOSSARY.................................................................................................................................... 201
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PREFACE
Paul W. Harvey was stationed at Sørvágur, Faroe Islands, during the British
occupation and acquired a knowledge of the Faroese language. For his own use,
he translated into English a primer of accidence, Føroysk Mállæra, published
byJákup Dahl in 1909, intend-ing this to be the nucleus of a larger grammar
suitable for English students and in this he was grateful for help from Jákup av
Skarði. Harvey was, however, unable to carry his plans further at the time and
later other commitments prevented him from proceeding with Faroese studies.
At Harvey's kind suggestion the present writer undertook to continue the
work, but decided to concentrate on the modern language only. It then became
increasingly evident that Dahl's book was not a suitable basis for a description
of modern Faroese. Like many of his contemporaries Dahl was an archaiser. He
discouraged some features which are an indispensable part of Faroese to-day
and his book does not always distinguish between obsolete and current forms.
In presenting his material he followed the arrangement of Wimmer's
Oldnordisk Formlære til Skolebrug (Accidence of Old Norse for Schools), but
modern,living Faroese cannot be thus treated - unless there are to be more
exceptions than rules.
In these circumstances Harvey agreed that it would be best if I prepared an
entirely new work in the form of a practical handbook based on average
acceptable usage to-day.
This book therefore describes the contemporary language only and without
reference to its historic evolution. The Faroes possess an extensive literature of
traditional ballads composed in somewhat archaic language. These are still
widely known, but I felt that the grammatical forms occurring in the ballads -
and occasionally taken up by some modern writers - could not be treated in this
work without obscuring the general picture of the living language, so making
the learner's task more difficult. All students of Faroese should possess
Føroysk-Donsk Orðabók2 by M. A. Jacobsen and Chr. Matras, 1961, and
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in this dictionary will find ample information regarding old forms found in the
ballads.
Owing to long neglect - the language has only come into general use in
writing during the present century - Faroese is not yet so regular as English.
There is a tendency to write in a style somewhat removed from spoken usage.
Many differing forms may be heard, some of which also appear in print, but in
this book alternatives have been sparingly quoted. Generally speaking, only
those forms are given which seem most likely to survive and become the
undisputed standard. It may be added that the present uncertain state of the
language, to say nothing of the Danish influence, especially in Tórs-havn itself,
often made the choice difficult and perhaps occasionally arbitrary.*
The lay-out of the book is as follows:
First, the Grammar deals with pronunciation, inflexions and syntax, a
knowledge of grammatical terms and customary abbreviations being assumed.
It seemed convenient and practical, e.g. under such headings as Adverbs,
Numerals, Conjunctions to introduce matter which technically belongs to
syntax. Faroese place-names have generally been translated, though uniformity
is this respect has not been aimed at. The various points of syntax have often
been illustrated with more examples than are strictly necessary, because I think
that such additional specimens of natural Faroese will be of more use to the
type of student Likely to use this book than a series of graduated exercises
would be. Needless to say, all the examples are strictly original Faroese. The
Reader begins with a conversation in Faroese and English on facing pages,
followed by representative selections of prose and verse. The Faroese Glossary,
finally, covers all the words occurring in the Reader and also those words in the
examples in the Grammar where their meanings or inflexions are not
automatically apparent.
A work like the present could not have been written without guidance from
native speakers of Faroese. In this connection I owe a debt of gratitude to many,
especially to my hosts during two long summers, Josefina and Jóan Christian
Poulsen in Hestur and Johanna and Christian Jensen and family in Tórshavn,
whose conversation and explanations have furnished a large portion of the
material here presented ; the Intonation Specimens are based on electrical
recordings
* I have discussed some aspects of the present condition of Faroese in an article
"Notes on the Faroese Language To-day" printed in Transactions of the Philological
Society, Volume for 1950.
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made from Ása Jensen's reading. I also received particular assistance from two
experienced teachers of Faroese, Betty Rasmussen and Rikard Long. For advice
on phonetic problems I am indebted to John Hathaway and Dr. Poul Andersen
and especially to Erik Petersen. Napoleon Djurhuus read my work in
manuscript and made valuable suggestions. Thanks are likewise due to
Valdemar Dalsgaard for his great assistance with the Conversation Piece and to
the helpful staff of the National Library in Tórshavn. Last, but certainly not
least, I wish to thank Professors Jón Helgason and Christian Matras for their
detailed and painstaking criticism of the whole work, which not only saved me
from many a slip, but enabled me greatly to improve the presentation of the
material generally.
Finally I acknowledge with gratitude the financial assistance given me by the
University of Birmingham to enable me to pursue my Faroese studies.
Publication of the present work was made possible thanks to subventions
generously provided by the Faroese Løgting, the Rask-Ørsted Fund and the
University of Birmingham.
This book is a pioneer work in many ways, for it is the first to attempt an all-
round description of Faroese. My aim has been to make the language more
accessible to Scandinavian specialist and general learner alike, and I sincerely
hope that the book will prove useful to all who wish to study the interesting
speech of the smallest of the Northern nations.
W. B. Lockwood.
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OTHER PARTS OF SPEECH.

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Concord § 154.................................................................................................... 152

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Conversation Piece, Faroese and English ........................................................... 158

FAROESE GLOSSARY.................................................................................................................................... 201

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