Declension of "makea"

[AldenG]

Of course, depending on your point of view, they can also be Finlandsbåtar(na). Same ship in the same direction, different passenger.

[onkko]

Those etymologies are fun and often surprising. I would not have connected "katu" and "gate." Do Finnish and Indo-European have a common ancestor? Or did they adopt words from each other? Or both? I have noticed small connections between Finnish and Russian; words like "xleb" and "leipä," and their very similar ways of saying "I have, you have . . ."

Loans, finland is finno-ugrian language with, of course, loanwords from nearby languages. Here is list probable russian loans http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luettelo_v ... a_sanoista but if you dont understand finnish be aware that many have changed what they mean like "suntio (muinaisvenäjä, rekonstruktio: sodija, tuomari) " Suntio is Sacristan (one with responsibility to take care of church property etc) and not judge like original old russian word.

[Rob A.]

Those etymologies are fun and often surprising. I would not have connected "katu" and "gate."

Nor did I....until it was pointed out in something I read. Though it is obvious once you know. Borrowed words that have been well and truly Finnicized can be hard to pick out....and I would say the average native speaker wouldn't know....and, of course, would not really care anyway. They are using the language as they learned it.

Often it takes many linguists and grammarians over a long period to work this stuff out.... And you have to watch that some word that might be similar in Russian, might actually have a Finno-Ugric origin... I can't think of any at the moment, but such words apparently are not uncommon in Russian.

Linguists tend to have the view that borrowing vocabulary is a common practice of many languages and is actually symptomatic that the language speakers are part of a dynamic culture...a culture that readily absorbs new ideas. The average person tends to think that a language should come up with its own words, but that is not what tends to happen. Typically when efforts are made to do this it seems to be more of a process driven by academics and nationalists... and I guess that's fine....if you can convince the local speakers it's a good idea....

[French and German come to mind....but the Académie française doesn't always get its way....one interesting thing I read about...not so much on the subject of borrowed words, but about word usage in general was about the French word, oignon.....apparently this word does not conform to modern French "orthographic standards".....but attempts to get the populace to change have been slow. Oignon is such a "classic" French word and so much part of the culture, I think it is almost "francophobic" to suggest it be changed... But what do I know....

[The reformed spelling is the rather anemic looking...ognon....]

[Aside: Apparently they've had more success with their "assault" on that other "classic" of written French....the circumflex..... goûter is now gouter....I guess that makes sense; all the circumflex is doing is telling you there was once an "s" there...in Old French the word was gouster..., which, of course, is much closer to the original Latin word, gustare...]

[Phineas]

No. There's not as much meaning in case-inflected nouns (or adjectives) alone as you might think. Which is a way of saying there's not as much meaning in a given case as you might think. For the most part, meaning in Finnish sentences resides in a verb+case combination. And changing the verb can really change the meaning you thought was attached to the case. It's all a bit like the notes in music that way. Any old C or E-flat or G in isolation don't convey very much. But play them together as a minor triad and suddenly you've made a statement.

Thanks for explaining that. Somewhere in the dialogue is the exchange:

Nancy: Mihin laivat lähtevät täältä?
Mikko: Ruotsiin, Ahvenanmaalle, Viroon ...

Mikko's reply led me to assume that "Ruotsin" in the title should have been "Ruotsiin." I suppose that Nancy's question contains the verb that specifies the meaning of the illative in Mikko's reply.

Seriously, the rule I learned about the -ta/-tä ending was that it was used either after a long vowel (as in tee or maa) or after a diphthong (lauantai or työ). As I understand it, the -Va (where V is a vowel other than a/ä) words aren't diphthongs.

And then there's the partitive plural....

Yeah (sigh) the partitive. I haven't studied it extensively, but already have a sense of foreboding. Doesn't the partitive violate some sort of international human rights treaty? I might have to lodge a formal complaint with the Finnish consul. That said, I really like some of its uses. Partitive objects for imperfect actions seems like a great idea.

Loans, finland is finno-ugrian language with, of course, loanwords from nearby languages. Here is list probable russian loans http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luettelo_v ... a_sanoista but if you dont understand finnish be aware that many have changed what they mean like "suntio (muinaisvenäjä, rekonstruktio: sodija, tuomari) " Suntio is Sacristan (one with responsibility to take care of church property etc) and not judge like original old russian word.

Thanks for that link. What about "ym" (Russian for "mind") and "ymmärtää " ? Just random similarity?

I've always been thrilled by how the proto-Germanic kuningaz (king) is still preserved as the Finnish and Estonian kuningas.

That is thrilling. I interrupted my wife's scrabble game to tell her and her friends about the kuningaz-kuningas connection. (Since they were playing scrabble, I thought they'd be in a logophilic mood.) They listened politely, said "Huh...oh...interesting..." Their tones of voice said "Please go away. Tell someone else." At any rate, I found it thrilling.

The English method of "describing the pronunciation of a word we can't pronounce with smaller words we can pronounce" has always seemed a bit silly to me, but I know it's natural for you.

Hah! That's true. Okay. I'll learn the IPA. Should have done it years ago.

[jahasjahas]

Hah! That's true. Okay. I'll learn the IPA. Should have done it years ago.

To be honest, I don't think I've ever written any IPA. But being able to read it might be useful in some situations. I learned it early on, since all the English books in school used IPA to describe pronunciation.

I suppose that Nancy's question contains the verb that specifies the meaning of the illative in Mikko's reply.

In a sense, yes. If Nancy's question had been "Mihin maahan olet rakastunut?" ("Which country do you love?") then the meaning of "Ruotsiin." would of course be completely different. The meaning is in the whole, not in the parts.

For comparison, "To Sweden." could be an answer to "Where are we going?" or "Who are we donating this statue of a giant moose to?" What, then, is the meaning of "to"?

[Pursuivant]

but if you dont understand finnish be aware that many have changed what they mean

This is the funniest one
pomo (помощник, pomoštšnik eli apulainen)
pomo=boss, original means assistant