Modern Icelandic as written does not differ very much from Old. Especially from the 19th century, it has in the main retained the orthog raphy of classical Icelandic, while in its earlier periods the orthography resembled more the Middle and was closer to the pronunciation. In this respect it differs very much from Old Icelandic. A number of the vowel sounds have changed. One example: 6 is spoken as the diphthong on and before tt almost as German ach. The same is true about the consonants. Examples: 11 (in certain cases) and ri spoken is dl. The same sounds as in English th in f athe and othinkp have V and retained. The accent is on the first syllable. As to the vocabulary, the modern Icelanders have with passionate zeal practised the exclusion of all foreign words and have formed new words, as occasion demanded it, from native material. There is, on the whole, much similarity between linguistic conditions in modern Greece and modern Iceland. The result of this purism so consistently carried out is that modern Ice landic has fewer words of foreign origin than any other language. New words have in many cases been coined successfully, as bokasafn (li brary), umra'da (discussion). But in a num ber of cases these attempts have not been so successful. Where it is impossible to coin new
words from Icelandic material, the strictest purists would rather avoid the use of the word or use an Icelandic word that has a somewhat similar significance.
Bibliography.— Fritzner, 'Ordbog over det gamle norske Sprog' (Christiania 1896) is the best dictionary; Cleasby-Vigfusson, Dictionary' (Oxford 1874) ; Egilsson, 'Lexicon Poeticum Antique Linguae Septentnonalis' (Copenhagen 1860, 2d ed. of this excellent work now being published by Finnur Jonsson) ; Thorkelsson, 'Supplementer til islandske OrdbOger) (Reykjavik 1876-97); Hegstad-Torp,