Ice, ice baby: 15 Swedish words for ice

Currently in the depths of winter, the Swedish landscape is covered in snow and ice.

I previously published a blog about 50 Swedish words for snow. So I became curious about how many words are there to describe ice.

I was surprised to find an enormous number of words. I guess it’s not so surprising for a Nordic country with so many lakes, rivers and waterways that there are many words to describe the different stages and shapes of frozen water.

Here are 15 of the words I found: 15 words for ice.

1. Is – the standard word for ice
2. Blankis – ice that shines like a mirror
3. Nyis – ice that’s only a couple of centimeters thick and transparent
4. Fast is – thick ice, often not transparent
5. Issörja – when the air is cold but the water is moving, a kind of ice slop forms
6. Tallrikis – plates of ice that form when above mentioned ice slop clusters together
7. Pannkaksis- similar to tallriksis but formed when water with different amount of salt content meet each other
8. Svallis – the kind of yellowish ice that freezes on mountainsides or rocky walls
9. Drivis – large pieces of ice that float on the water and are driven by wind
10. Isflak – a large, loose sheet of ice floating on water
11. Rutten is – literally ‘rotten ice’, the first stage of thawing ice
12. Skruvis – when thin ice layers itself on top of each other, like filo pastry.
13. Istapp – icicle
14. Svartis – black ice on the ground
15. Glattis – an evenly compact layer of ice on the ground

What other words for ice do you know?

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