THE BASICS

Guþlanisk verbs fall into two catagories: strong and weak.

There are two tenses: present and preterite. As with some Indo-European languages, the difference between present and preterite is the same as non-past and past. The present forms are used for both present and future (future being a non-past tense). We find this in our Modern English as well "I am going to the store tomorrow", with the present tense having future meaning equivalent to "will go". Similarly, the preterite forms include the functions of several different tenses in Modern English, such as the simple past "did", perfect "has done", and pluperfect "had done". There are three moods: indicative, optative/subjunctive, and imperative. These moods are formed with either the preterite or present stems, except for the imperative, which only uses the present stem. Typically, the past subjunctive forms express potential completed actions, whereas the present subjunctive has no such implication of completion. This is parallel somewhat to Modern English's "might have done" vs. "might do". And finally, there are two voices in Guþanisk: active and passive.

Guþlanisk verbs abide by the IP-V2 SVO word order. This means that the second constituent (a word or a group of words that functions as a single unit) of declarative main clauses is always a verb, but not necessarily the case in other types of clauses. For example:

I READ THE BOOK TODAY.

Ek ana-kunnði sa bokos himma-dagana.

TODAY READ I THE BOOK.

Himma-dags ana-kunnði ek þana bokana.

INFINITIVES

Infinitives are marked by the ending -an. The infinitive may appear as the subject of a clause standing alone, accompanied by du, or modified by the article þata.

The infinitive is often complementary to governing verbs, taking the same subject when the infinitive is the object of another verb. This may also occur with adjectives and nouns.

The infinitive may also denote purpose when in conjunction with verbs of motion standing alone, or following "du".

The infinitive may also express result when used with the conjunctions "swa-swe" (even as/just as) and "swa-ei" (so that/so as). The subject of this infinitive takes the accusative.

Infinitives with Cases

The subject of an infinitive usually takes the accusative, the accusative with the infinitive is equivalent to a clause with finite verbs in Modern English. A construction such as this may function as the object of a verb and may also function as the subject of a verb.

This can also be done with the dative case. This occurs when the infinitive itself is the subject of the clause.