óleyfilega

Óleyfilega is an Icelandic adverb meaning illegally or unlawfully, used to describe actions that contravene law or regulation. It functions to modify verbs and describe the manner in which something is done, indicating that the action is not permitted by law.

Etymology and form: The word is built from the negative prefix ó- attached to a form related to leyfi, meaning permission or license, and to the adjective líkely associated with leyfilegur, meaning legal or permitted. Óleyfilega thus conveys the sense of “not legally permitted” and is commonly used in formal or journalistic Icelandic to express illegality.

Usage and context: Óleyfilega appears in legal texts, policy discussions, and media reporting to label actions as illegal or unauthorized. It can describe processes, acts, or conditions that fail to meet statutory requirements. The term is closely related to other grammatical forms such as óleyfilegt (neuter singular adjective) and leyfilegur (legal or permissible), and it is chosen when the emphasis is on illegality rather than legality.

See also: Óleyfilegur, leyfi, illegal, unlawful. The term should be distinguished from neutral or permissible descriptors, and its exact syntactic placement depends on Icelandic grammar and the sentence structure in which it appears. Pronunciation is typically rendered approximately as oh-LEY-file-ga in English phonetics.