# Icelandic: að gosa



## Alxmrphi

> *Aska úr Merapi hamlar flugi*
> 
> Mörg flugfélög hafa frestað flugi milli Singapúr og Djakarta í  Indónesíu um óákveðinn tíma. Ástæðan er mikil aska frá eldfjallinu  Merapi á eyjunni Jövu. Meðal flugfélaganna eru Lufthansa, Singapore  Airlines og Japan Airlines. Eldgos hófst í Merapi-fjalli fyrir tveimur  vikum. Meira en 130 hafa látið lífið af völdum gossins.
> 
> Eldfjallið Merapi *hefur gosið* í tvær vikur samfleytt.





> *Ash from Merapi interrupts flights*
> Many airlines have postponed flights between Singapore and Jakarta in Indonesia for an unknown period of time. The reason is due to ash from the Merapi volcano on the island of Jovu. Among the airlines affected are Lufthansa, Singapore Airlines and Japan Airlines. The eruption of the volcano began two weeks ago. More than 130 people have lost their lives as a result of the volcano.
> 
> The Merapi volcano *has been erupting* continuously for two weeks.


Hi all,

I am just assuming that* að gosa* means '*to erupt*', right?
I can't find it in any of the dictionaries I have access to, and I'm not sure why? Is it not a normal verb? Is it new? I found gjósa and spúa, so I am a bit confused as to why this hasn't been used?

I did find_ a__ð gosa_ on Beygingarlýsing, but that lists the past participle as gosað, not gosið, so I'm a bit confused about this as well.
Anyone know anything about this? Corrections on the translation welcome as well 

Takk fyrir.


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## hanne

Mildly off-topic, but:



> The reason is due to ...


That's bad English!  "The reason is..." or "The situation is due to ...", but the [|]reason[/i] isn't caused by anything.

And, while I'm being picky, the word "affected" is you own addition .


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## Alxmrphi

hanne said:


> Mildly off-topic, but:
> That's bad English!  "The reason is..." or "The situation is due to ...", but the [|]reason[/i] isn't caused by anything.



Translating creates unnatural English at times, I edited my version many times trying to make it sound natural, but I suppose you_ might _be right. It certainly isn't '_bad_' English, I think you might be overreacting to this . I think I was thinking about saying the 'situation is due to' but _ástæða _is marked as '_reason_' in my mind and I think that took over. Over 90,000 hits on Google for this construction.



> And, while I'm being picky, the word "affected" is you own addition


Yes, I know  It makes for a better translation. Actually, without inserting something that's not in the Icelandic it results for a very odd sentence in English.


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## JógaUgla

According to the dictionary used in conjunction with the Icelandic Online course, the verb is _að gjósa_.

*gjósa* v (dat) (*gýs*; *gaus*, *gusu*, *gosið*)


    (um eldfjöll) erupt
(um hveri) spout, gush
(um sjúkdóm) ~ upp – break out
 
Verbix.com lists _"Hann hefur gosið"_ as the present perfect indicative of _að gjósa_.


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## Alxmrphi

Oh my god of course.
I completely didn't realise, it's the _gjósa -> gosi_ð distinction.
Those verbs always manage to throw me and I end up looking for different verbs.

Thanks for pointing that out Joga


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## Silver_Biscuit

You're going to kick yourself. It is *að gjósa*. Check the *sagnbót* on the _Beygingarlýsing íslensks nútímamáls _(what is the proper grammatical translation for sagnbót, by the way?).

Edit: Ah, too late.


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## Alxmrphi

Silver_Biscuit said:


> (what is the proper grammatical translation for sagnbót, by the way?).



Past participle 

Edit: It's similar to the lýsingarháttur þátíðar, which English doesn't have anymore (even though its name is also 'past participle'), but used to in sentences like "Jesus is come", where you use 'is' + 'past participle' to mean the past (Jesus has come (back)) etc. As I'm sure you know this has been retained in Icelandic (hann er farinn), and changes form, but is essentially a different type of participle that doesn't have a name in English (as far as I am aware) because we don't have this in the language. I think you'd just use the general 'participle' to describe this.

So '*they have gone*' could be either:

_Þeir hafa *farið*. (this is *sagnb*_*ót*)
_Þeir eru* farnir*_. (_this is* lýsingarháttur þátíðar*_)


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## JógaUgla

Now, if only I knew what "present perfect indicative" meant. I think the English equivalent would be: "has erupted." Does that seem right?


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## Alxmrphi

JógaUgla said:


> Now, if only I knew what "present perfect indicative" meant. I think the English equivalent would be: "has erupted." Does that seem right?



Yes, it would, but Icelandic doesn't have the same tense system as English, we have a progressive form 'has been erupting' which is required here because of the word for 'continuously', you can't say "It has erupted continuously for 2 weeks", because this is not the intended meaning, you need to show that it never stopped, not that it was doing separate (complete) eruptions for 2 weeks.

Icelandic doesn't have this tense, but English does and it's required in English (but in Icelandic the other form is used).
Indicative is a grammatical 'mood', talking about the factual world, the main mood we use all the time (compared to the other moods like subjunctive/imperative/conditional).

'Present perfect' is just the name of a tense.

I have eaten the apple. -> "have eaten" = present perfect tense
I ate the apple. -> "I ate" = past simple.


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## Silver_Biscuit

Look who's a linguistics student!  Thanks. Past participle, I ought to have known that.

P.S. You can say 'has been doing something / hafa verið að gera eitthvað', though, I think. Also 'hann er búinn að gera eitthvað' pretty much means 'he's been doing something', although does of course imply that he's no longer doing it. I think I could say 'Ég er búin að vera að læra íslensku í næstum tvö ár' as well, which _doesn't_ imply that I've stopped learning.


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## sindridah

Alex!!! Shame on you!!


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