Ng and nk rule • Ylhýra – Learn Icelandic

Pronunciation before ng and nk

Words that contain the letters ng and nk have an unintuitive pronunciation: The word “þungur” is pronounced “þúngur” and the word “fingur” is pronounced “fíngur”.

The reason for this is that the sounds ng and nk are created with the tongue close to the roof of the mouth, and that is much easier to do if the sound that comes before it was also created with the tongue close to the roof of the mouth. The two vowels in Icelandic that are created with the tongue close to the roof of the mouth are í and ú and therefore all sounds before ng and nk want to either be í or ú.

The rules are:

a before ng or nk is pronounced á (remember that “á” is itself pronounced as “aú”, it ends in an ú sound)
- langur ([lángur]), banka ([bánka])
u before ng or nk is pronounced ú
- þungur ([þúngur]), punktur ([púnktur])
e before ng is pronounced ei (remember that “ei” is itself pronounced as “eí”, it ends in an í sound)
- lengi ([leíngi])
ö before ng or nk is pronounced au (remember that “au” is itself pronounced as “öí”, it ends in an í sound)
- löng ([löíng]), bönkum ([böínkum])
i before ng or nk is pronounced í
- fingur ([fíngur]), klink ([klínk])
y before ng or nk is pronounced ý (remember that “ý” is the same sound as í)
- syngur ([sýngur]), þyngd ([þýngd])