Finnish Phrase Book

Finnish is a unique, intricate, subtle language spoken by some 41; nullton people. It is not an Indo-European language: il belongs to the Finno-Ugrian group. Its only close relation is Estontan,* spoken by an estimated 1!, million people. With its many vowels and its system of vowel harmony, Finnish is a melodic language. It is also a difficult one for the foreigner to learn. In the first place, he will recognize extremely few of the words. Even such an international word as “telephone” is unrecognizable in Finnish. It is puhelin (derived from puhuato spcak). The grammatical structure is complex and complicated. There are 15 cases! Instead of prepositions such as “to”, “from”, “in”, Finnish uses a variety of suffixes to show case. These are added to nouns, pronouns and adjectives—and to infinitives, of which there are four. The addition of a suffix can radically alter the sound and spelling of a word, causing it to undergo consonant or vowel changes. Obviously, then, no attempt can be made here to give anything but the briefest outline of some features of Finnish grammar. Articles There are no articles (indefinite or definite) in Finnish. Thus poika can mean “boy”, ‘““a boy” or “the boy”. Hungarian 1 the other main Finno-Ugrian language, but since the two branches Sp (some 2,000 years ago, there is little similarity between them now at least to the leyman