Icelanders had now started to travel more and more and as a result, influenced by other nations at a much larger scale. This, of course, affected the naming system like everything else and at this point in time, you can see new names, popular for example with the royals popping up in Iceland. Today we see those same influencers as we have seen for quite a long time. They come through books, magazines, television and outstanding personas.
What about the Icelandic last names? As we have been doing throughout this intro to Icelandic names I will give an example. A man and a woman get married. Once they are married this will not change, they both keep their names just as they are.
A few years later they have a baby girl. The reason for the change in the last name is their gender. She is named Ragna. So, what does the system tell us? The fact of the matter is that in Iceland you can not name your child whatever you desire.
If you, for example, want to name your child Jennifer, something which has never been done in Iceland, you will need to go through Mannanafnanefnd, or the Naming Committee, to get acceptance. The committee is made up of people in the academic world, lawyers and scholars who are deemed fit to rule in each case and do so according to laws from Laws who many think are outdated.
Note: If the name has been used before you have no trouble using the name again and can name your child easily without any interference from the committee. The very existence of this committee has been criticized a lot in recent times. Some argue that we need to keep the committee for the sake of our language but others that the committee is breaking human rights with their denials. Whatever opinion you might have it is always fun to see which names are being accepted and declined!
Fun Fact: if you can find the name you are applying for in any Icelandic literature from settlement to modern times the name is automatically allowed. This was the case with the name Refur e. Fox but it was unused from settlement until when a baby boy was given the name. It had then been unused years! At first glance, the Icelandic language can be a little intimidating.
Some words seem to trail on for miles. And many letters in the Icelandic alphabet are strangers to English speakers. Here are the words that Icelanders miss the most from Icelandic when trying to speak another language.
Some are great, others maybe a little less so. Let's find out. Icelandic, the language of Iceland is one of the most difficult languages one can start to learn. Its miraculous ways of changing each and every word into numerous different forms to make it fit into a sentence will confuse even the brighte March 15, Anthropologist, social media guru, Icelandic nature and food enthusiast.
General About Names in Iceland. Share this article via facebook Share this article via twitter Share this article via messenger Share this with Share this article via email Share this article via flipboard Copy link.
Share this article via comment Share this article via facebook Share this article via twitter. More Stories. Today's Best Discounts. Get us in your feed Like us on Facebook Follow us on Twitter. Three things make it particularly peculiar: there are no family names although some families adopt ancestral names related to places , it is not possible to take the name of a spouse and when naming your child, it has to comply with a list of naming rules.
These rules come with good reason, however. While Iceland is considered a Scandinavian country along with Norway, Sweden and Denmark, only in Iceland do they continue with this form of naming. There are some exceptions, of course. There are also other exceptions in that a very egalitarian child takes two last names, the name of the mother with the appropriate suffix and the name of the father with the appropriate suffix — akin to the Western tradition of taking both parents last names into a hyphenated one.
There are also some family names that Icelanders use that have been adopted from parents who were immigrants — the actress, Anita Briem, and the former prime minister, Geir Haarde, for example. Since , the law only allows one to adopt a new family name if one has a legal right to do so through inheritance. When it comes to first names, parents must use a name that is already on a legal list of possible names, of which there are currently 1, male names and 1, female names.
If the parents want to name their child a name that is not on the list, they must send a request to the Icelandic Naming Committee and wait for acceptance, which is based on whether the name can be incorporated into the Icelandic language grammar. The law states specifically that the name must not conflict with the linguistic structure of Icelandic, meaning the way the name is declined.
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