Keywords: grammatical categories, gender, word formation, inflection, syntax, semantics

The aim of this paper is to explain the foundations of the Icelandic gender system, particularly the morpholgical relation between masculine and feminine. The paper also aims to “correct” a certain misconception of the position of grammatical feminine as opposed to masculine which appears in discussions about equality of rights and also about theological cencerns.

The first section of the paper is an exposition of the relation between natural (or biological) and grammatical gender.

The second deals with the category of gender in modern Icelandic.

The third section is devoted to the prehistory of the Icelandic gender system, first it treats the origin of the Indo-European gender system and the development of feminine in Indo-European, then it explains the origin of feminine suffixes of Icelandic.

The fourth section discusses some problems concerning the formation of feminine nouns in opposition to masculine nouns, especially in categories of profession.

The fifth section contains brief notes on the nouns maður ‘human being, man’ and guð ‘god’.

The sixth section is an epilogue.