# Icelandic: Bjóða



## ShakeyX

The entry for bjóða in the dictionary is completely confusing and I wondered if someone could give some examples to set me straight.

*1.* (_~ fram_) offer*~ e-m e-ð* offer sby sth


*2.* (_~ upp á_) invite, ask*~ e-m heim* invite sby home

*~ e-m í mat* ask sby to dinner

Why in the brackets of number 2. does it say Bjóða upp á, when I am fairly certain that is used to mean to offer up food. I always assumed the words in the brackets were synonyms. Can you bjóða upp á einhverjum to dinner? Can someone post some examples using upp á and the single form.


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## ShakeyX

Plís! Hjálpið þið mér.


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## Silver_Biscuit

You're right, that's not a very good dictionary. Bjóða upp á does mean to offer (often food), and you cannot "bjóða upp á einhverjum í kvöldmat" - that is nonsense as you suspected (unless of course you're a cannibal).

Stop using digicoll as your main dictionary, see if you can scrape together 790 kr and just get ordabok.is.


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## Alxmrphi

Silver_Biscuit said:


> Stop using digicoll as your main dictionary, see if you can scrape together 790 kr and just get ordabok.is.



Like I do! 
There was a time not long ago, as a poor, poor student, that I was on own-brand food for weeks but 790kr for 3 months of ordabok.is was still totally worth it.


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## Silver_Biscuit

Alxmrphi said:


> Like I do!
> There was a time not long ago, as a poor, poor student, that I was on own-brand food for weeks but 790kr for 3 months of ordabok.is was still totally worth it.



If you only want it for one computer, 790 will buy you a whole year. I'm not a salesperson for this online resource, but that is so incredibly worth it.


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## ShakeyX

"I'm not a salesperson for this online resource..."

The plot thickens!


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## Alxmrphi

> If you only want it for one computer, 790 will buy you a whole year.


Ah, I opt for the heimilisáskrift because I move around different computers, but it only takes up two. Sindri has my third computer allowance.


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## Gavril

Silver_Biscuit said:


> You're right, that's not a very good dictionary. Bjóða upp á does mean to offer (often food), and you cannot "bjóða upp á einhverjum í kvöldmat" - that is nonsense as you suspected (unless of course you're a cannibal).
> 
> Stop using digicoll as your main dictionary, see if you can scrape together 790 kr and just get ordabok.is.



While Digicoll isn't the most comprehensive dictionary out there, and it can be annoying to use it for English -> Icelandic searches, I've found it to be very reliable in the accuracy of its definitions -- certainly more so than Ordabok.is during the time that I used it (though I understand that Ordabok.is has made some significant updates over the past several months).

In the case of *bjóða upp á*, I don't know if Digicoll's translation was so inaccurate: one of the dictionaries at Snara.is gives the definition,



> *bjóða e-m upp á e-ð*
> biðja e-n að gera sér e-ð að góðu, að þiggja e-ð
> bjóða upp á veitingar



This seems to fit with the definition "invite (someone) to (something)", although, if you leave out _e-m _(i.e., the dative of the person being invited), it might be better to translate _bjóða upp á (ehv)_ as "offer (something)".


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## Silver_Biscuit

It's simply extremely limited in the information it gives, and in this case it hasn't really explained itself properly, as it were. I wouldn't have understood what "bjóða upp á" was supposed to mean from the Digicoll entry, since it really is more "offer" than "invite" or "ask". If you "bjóða [einhverjum] upp á veitingar" you are offering/providing [someone] food. You could say that you were "inviting someone to partake of food" if you wanted to use the word invite, but it's not a great translation (and this is not the same as inviting someone to dinner). Ordabok.is has this:

"*bjóða upp á:* offer, treat to;
gera kleift   bjóða upp á: facilitate, provide, offer, allow for, allow of"

Which is absolutely spot on - we have both definitions for the phrase, of which Digicoll gives zero indication. At best Digicoll is confusing and inadequate on this point, and you could easily go so far as to say inaccurate since it's been lumped in with the "invite, ask" definition rather than "offer". Má bjóða þér upp á kaffi? - Can I offer you / treat you to a coffee? (You might like to note that this is basically exactly the same as Má bjóða þér kaffi, but Digicoll puts the phrase into a different definition) Hvað bjóðið þið upp á? - What's on the menu / on offer? And what I quoted is just a small part of the entire entry for bjóða, which is comprehensive, full of phrasing/context examples and completely accurate. As I find ordabok.is always is - I'm not sure what inaccuracy you are talking about.


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## Gavril

Silver_Biscuit said:


> It's simply extremely limited in the information it gives, and in this case it hasn't really explained itself properly, as it were. I wouldn't have understood what "bjóða upp á" was supposed to mean from the Digicoll entry, since it really is more "offer" than "invite" or "ask".



You're right that this Digicoll entry could give a misleading impression of what _bjóða upp á _means, but _bjóða upp á _isn't the focus of this entry -- it only appears in parentheses, in order to specify one of the meanings of the simple verb _bjóða._

Still, I agree that Digicoll could have been clearer in this case, and it should have included a specific entry for _bjóða upp á._



> If you "bjóða [einhverjum] upp á veitingar" you are offering/providing [someone] food.



OK, but then I'm not sure why the monolingual Snara dictionary translates _bjóða e-m upp á e-ð+_ as "*biðja *eihvern að gera sér e-ð góðu / að þiggja e-ð". As far as I know, _biðja_ means "to request, ask for": if you _biðja _someone to accept something, then you aren't simply making an offer -- you're also hoping the other person accepts the offer. If this definition holds, it seems accurate to translate _bjóða e-m upp á e-ð_ as "to ask/invite (someone) to (something)", at least in some contexts.


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## Silver_Biscuit

Gavril said:


> OK, but then I'm not sure why the monolingual Snara dictionary translates _bjóða e-m upp á e-ð+_ as "*biðja *eihvern að gera sér e-ð góðu / að þiggja e-ð". As far as I know, _biðja_ means "to request, ask for": if you _biðja _someone to accept something, then you aren't simply making an offer -- you're also hoping the other person accepts the offer. If this definition holds, it seems accurate to translate _bjóða e-m upp á e-ð_ as "to ask/invite (someone) to (something)", at least in some contexts.



What contexts? Do you have an example of what you're thinking of?

Snara can't really use bjóða in the definition of bjóða upp á - what they have seems like a pretty fair rewording of the concept of offering. Of course offering and inviting are connected (both being expressed in Icelandic using bjóða), and bjóða einhverjum upp á eitthvað does mean to _invite_ someone to partake of something, as I said - but this is more usually expressed in English using the word offer.


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## Silver_Biscuit

For example, here are some contexts in which I have heard / would expect to hear _bjóða upp á_, and where I would not:

Símon bauð Tómasi í partý - Símon invited Tómas to a party
Símon bauð Tómasi upp á partý -  If anything, Símon offered to pay for  or throw a party for Tómas
Símon bauð gestunum ís - Símon offered the guests icecream
Símon bauð gestunum upp á ís - Símon offered the guests / provided the guests with icecream
Símon og Tómas fóru út í kaffihús og Símon bauð Tómasi upp á kaffi -  Símon and Tómas went to a café and Símon treated Tómas to a coffee
Kaffihúsið bauð upp á margar kökur - The café had lots of cakes on offer
Fyrirtækið býður upp á frábæra þjónustu - The company offers/provides brilliant service
Farfuglaheimilið býður upp á tveggja, fjögurra og sex manna herbergi - The hostel offers/provides two, four and six person rooms


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## Gavril

Silver_Biscuit said:


> What contexts? Do you have an example of what you're thinking of?



_Hann bauð henni upp á kvöldverð_ "He asked her to dinner" or "He invited her to dinner"
_Hann bauð mér upp á kaffibolla _"He invited me to have a cup of coffee with him (hoping that I would say yes)"



> Snara can't really use bjóða in the definition of bjóða upp á - what they have seems like a pretty fair rewording of the concept of offering.


 
Snara defines the simple verb *bjóða *as "segja e-m e-ð velkomið, láta í frammi" -- as far as I can see, there is no necessary implication of _biðja (að þiggja e-ð)_ here, unlike the definition of _bjóða e-m upp á e-ð._


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## Silver_Biscuit

Gavril said:


> _Hann bauð henni upp á kvöldverð_ "He asked her to dinner" or "He invited her to dinner"
> _Hann bauð mér upp á kaffibolla _"He invited me to have a cup of coffee with him (hoping that I would say yes)"



I don't think these translations are quite accurate. These sentences both have the meaning of treating or offering. If they happen in a public context the implication is that the subject paid for the object - "He treated her to dinner" and "He treated me to a coffee". If they happen at the subject's home, the object is simply being offered or provided with something - "He offered her dinner / He provided her with dinner" and "He offered me a coffee".
The subject and the object are in the same place, and this place is where the coffee/dinner will be had, there is no invitation to dinner or going out to coffee together, bjóða by itself is used for this (Hann bauð henni í kvöldverð, Hann bauð mér út í kaffi). The question of whether the subject particularly wants the object to accept is not super relevant, I'm just talking about how the phrase is actually used. That's the best explanation I can manage, you can believe me or not.

Edit: I'll restate this also:



> Símon bauð Tómasi í partý -  Símon invited Tómas to a party
> Símon bauð Tómasi upp á partý -  If anything, Símon offered to pay for  or throw a party for Tómas



Imagine kvöldmatur or kvöldverður instead of partý and it's the same point. Just because both make sense if you use kvöldmatur instead of partý doesn't mean they make the _same_ sense.


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