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Finnish |
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| Finno-Ugric | Baltic-Finnic |  Finland  European Union Minority In:  Sweden |
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Cases in Finnish are numerous and descriptive. They form the basic relationships between different nouns in a sentences. They also describe direction and position for verbs.
Contents |
The Grammatical Cases
There is a distinction between objects that can be counted and those that can't. An object that can be counted is something that represents the whole entity of an object. For example: car, person, and tool would be countable objects. A non-countable object is one that represents a sort of substance, but only the essence of that substance. For example: water, air, power, energy.
Nominative Case
-no ending, + t plural
This is the basic case of all nouns in Finnish. This implies the whole thing of a particular noun.
Genitive Case
The genitive case is marked by the suffix -n, on the genitive stem. The genitive case is used to show possession, and is also used before postpositions (but NOT prepositions).
The Genitive Stem
In many languages, there exist different stems to which affixes can be added. For the most part, Finnish nouns contain just two stems, the nominative and the genitive. The nominative stem is used by the nominative case, all other cases use the genitive. The genitive case can be marked with a handful of changes, the most two common being:
- i -> e, this change is seen most commonly in native Finnish words, not in loans. Ex: äiti (mother) -> äiden (mother's)
- Vowel harmony and consonant gradation. This can be guaranteed to effect every word.
Accusative Case
Finnish contains two different kinds of accusative case, the -n accusative, and the nominative accusative. A distinct accusative case is only found in pronouns, otherwise it uses one of the aforementioned endings. The accusative indicates telicity which means that the action in question has been finished. The accusative case is also used to indicate that the action is preformed on all of the object.
-N Accusative
The -n accusative looks identical to the genitive case, and it also requires the use of the genitive stem. The -n accusative is used in direct address when the object is in the singular.
"Nominative" Accusative
The "nominative" accusative looks identical to the nominative case. This type of accusative is used in imperatives, but is most frequently seen in the plural accusative. The plural accusative uses the nominative plural endings.
Partitive Case
-a/ä, -ta/tä, -tta/ttä
This case marks the absence of telicity, meaning that the action is not yet done. This case also indicates that the action is only done to a part of the object, or a part of the object at a time. The partitive is used after all numerals except 1, with prepositions (but NOT postpositions!), and with negative statements that don't really identify a specific amount of the object.
a/ä ending forms
ends in short vowels doesn't have collapsible e
| Comparison of Nominative and Partitive Forms - a/ä endings | ||
|---|---|---|
| Nominative | Partitive | |
| own | oma | oma/a |
| day | päivä | päivä/ä |
| old | vanha | vanha/a |
| life | elämä | elämä/ä |
| house | talo | talo/a |
| chair | tuoli | tuoli/a |
| Finland | Suomi | Suome/a |
| home | koti | koti/a |
| town | kaupunki | kaupunki/a |
| Helsinki | Helsinki | Helsinki/ä |
| all | kaikki | kaikke/a |
ta/tä ending forms
ends in a long vowel or diphthong an e that can be dropped basic form ending in a consonant monosyllabic forms
| Comparison of Nominative and Partitive Forms - ta/tä endings | ||
|---|---|---|
| country | maa | maa/ta |
| reason | syy | syy/tä |
| road | tie | tie/tä |
| work | työ | työ/tä |
| night | yö | yö/tä |
| moon | kuu | kuu/ta |
| language | kieli | kiel/tä |
| snow | lumi | lun/ta |
| small | pieni | pien/tä |
| sound | ääni | ään/tä |
| sea | meri | mer/ta |
| water | vesi | vet/tä |
| new | uusi | uut/ta |
| person | ihminen | ihmis/tä |
| goodness | hyvyys | hyvyyt/tä |
| thought | ajatus | ajatus/ta |
| question | kysymys | kysymys/tä |
| thanks | kiitos | kiitos/ta |
| telephone | puhelin | puhelin/ta |
| man | mies | mies/tä |
| beer | olut | olut/ta |
| this | tämä | tä/tä |
| it | se | si/tä |
| which(relative) | joka | jo/ta |
| which | mikä | mi/tä |
| who | kuka | ke/tä |
tta/ttä ending forms
e endings that are kept
| Comparison of Nominative and Paritive Forms - tta/ttä endings | ||
|---|---|---|
| family | perhe | perhe/ttä |
| machine | kone | kone/tta |
| feeling | tunne | tunne/tta |
| letter | kirje | kirje/ttä |
| mistake | virhe | virhe/ttä |
a/ä plural ending forms
when the inflectional stem ends in a short vowel
| Comparison of Nominative and Partitive Plural Forms - a/ä endings | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| nom sing | nom plur | part sing | part plur | |
| house | talo | talo/t | talo/a | talo/j/a |
| hour | tunti | tunni/t | tunti/a | tunte/j/a |
| stone | kivi | kive/t | kive/ä | kiv/i/ä |
| wind | tuuli | tuule/t | tuul/ta | tuul/i/a |
| hand | käsi | käde/t | kät/tä | käs/i/ä |
ta/tä plural ending forms
stems with a long vowel
| Comparison of Nominative and Partitive Plural Forms - ta/tä endings | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| nom sing | nom plur | part sing | part plur | |
| country | maa | maa/t | maa/ta | ma/i/ta |
| moon | kuu | kuu/t | kuu/ta | ku/i/ta |
| reason | syy | syy/t | syy/tä | sy/i/tä |
| night | yö | yö/t | yö/tä | ö/i/tä |
The Locative Cases
The locative cases indicate location, in a way that is commonly preformed with the use of prepositions in other languages.
Inessive Case
The inessive case uses the ending -ssa/-ssä on the genitive stem. This case indicates "in" or "inside." It's also used in many time expressions.
| Nominative | Inessive |
|---|---|
| talo | talossa |
| yö | yössä |
| huone | huoneessa |
Elative Case
The elative case uses the ending -sta/-stä on the genitive stem. This case indicates "from," or "out of." It's also frequently used in time expressions to indicate "since time," as well as origin or cause.
| Nominative | Elative |
|---|---|
| talo | talosta |
| yö | yöstä |
| huone | huoneesta |
Illative Case
The illative case uses the ending -Vn, on the nominative stem, V indicates the preceding vowel. When the preceding vowel is long, the ending is -seen. The plural is indicated by -hVn when the word is one syllable, or the word's plural contains a vowel besides 'i' just before the plural ending. If the word is polysyllabic and contains no vowels besides -i in the last syllable of the plural, the ending is -siin.
The illative case indicates "into," but is also used in time expressions for "until time."
| Nominative | Illative |
|---|---|
| talo | taloon |
| yö | yöhön |
| huone | huoneeseen |
Allative Case
The allative case uses the ending -lla/-llä, on the genitive stem. It means "on top of" or "in the close proximity of." It may also be used with possession, time, instrument means or way.
| Nominative | Illative |
|---|---|
| talo | talolla |
| yö | yöllä |
| huone | huoneella |
Ablative Case
The ablative case uses the ending -lta/-ltä, on the genitive stem. It means "from off of."
| Nominative | Illative |
|---|---|
| talo | talolta |
| yö | yöltä |
| huone | huoneelta |
Allative Case
The allative case uses the ending -lle, on the genitive stem. It means "onto," but is also used to indicate "for/to someone."
| Nominative | Illative |
|---|---|
| talo | talolle |
| yö | yölle |
| huone | huoneelle |
See also
| Finnish pages
|
|---|
| Introduction · Adjectives · Cases · Lexicon · Negative Verb · Numbers · Pronouns · Sounds and Writing · Suffixes · Verbs |
| Finno-Ugric Languages | |
|---|---|
| Baltic-Finnic |  Estonian · Finnish ·  Ingrian ·  Karelian ·  Livonian ·  Veps ·  Votic ·  Võro
|
| Permic |  Komi ·  Udmurt
|
| Ugric |  Hungarian ·  Khanty ·  Mansi
|
| N/A |  Erzya ·  Mari · Moksha
|
