gættir

Gáttir is the Icelandic plural of gátt, a noun meaning door, gate, or entrance. In normal usage, gáttir refer to physical openings that provide access to a building, room, enclosure, or other space, such as gates in a fence or doors in a wall. The term can be used for both single openings and multiple openings, and it may appear in architectural descriptions, inventories, and everyday speech.

Etymology and related forms: Gátt originates from Old Norse gátt, a word in the same Germanic family as the English word gate. The Icelandic form gátt and its plural gáttir reflect regular development within the language, distinguishing physical openings from other related words such as gata, which means street or road.

Usage and notes: In contemporary Icelandic, gáttir is primarily a concrete term for entrances and gateways. It can also be used metaphorically to speak of entry points or opportunities in a broader sense, though such usage is less common in everyday language than the literal sense. For streets, Icelandic uses gata rather than gátt, helping to differentiate between public thoroughfares and built entrances.

Overall, gáttir is a standard term in Icelandic for describing doors and gates, with a precise architectural sense and occasional metaphorical applications in more general contexts.