Estonian
From UniLang Wiki
Tere! Estonian belongs to the Baltic-Finnic subgroup of Finno-Ugric family of languages, and is very closely related to Finnish and fairly distantly related to Hungarian. It is spoken as an official language in the Republic of Estonia, and is referred to by its (approximately) 1.25 million speakers as eesti keel.
The Estonian language consists of 14 grammatical cases: Nominative, Genitive, Partitive, Inessive, Illative, Elative, Allative, Adessive, Abessive, Ablative, Translative, Terminative, Essive and Comitative.
Contents |
Orthography
A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J, K, L, M, N, O, P, Q, R, S, Š, Z, Ž, T, U, V, W, Õ, Ä, Ö, Ü, X, Y
Like Finnish, Estonian uses the Latin alphabet, in addition, the Estonian alphabet contains letters ä, ö, ü, and õ, plus the later additions š and ž. The letters c, q, w, x and y are only used in proper names of foreign origin, and f, z, š, and ž appear in loanwords and foreign names only. Ö, and ü are pronounced similarly to their equivalents in Swedish and German. Õ represents the sound /ɤ/, an unrounded /o/.
Phonology
Vowels
| Front | Back | |||
| Unrounded | Rounded | Unrounded | Rounded | |
| Close | i | y | u | |
| Mid | e | ø | ɤ | o |
| Open | æ | ɑ | ||
Consonants
| Bilabial | Labiodental | Alveolar | Postalveolar | Palatal | Velar | Glottal | |
| Plosive | p pʲ | t tʲ | k kʲ | ||||
| Nasal | m | n nʲ | (ŋ)1 | ||||
| Fricative | (f) | s sʲ | (ʃ) | h | |||
| Approximant | ʋ | l lʲ | j | ||||
| Trill | r |
Grammar
Pronouns
Estonian pronouns come in two lengths: short and long.
| Nominative Pronouns | ||
|---|---|---|
| Short | Long | |
| 1 sg | Ma | Mina |
| 2 sg | Sa | Sina |
| 3 sg (m,f,n) | Tema | Ta |
| 1 pl | Me | Meie |
| 2 pl | Te | Teie |
| 3 pl | Nad | Nemad |
Two Infinitves
Estonian is a language that has two infinitives. They are the -ma infinitive and the -da infinitive namely because of the ending of the verbs. For example: naljatama/naljatada (to joke).
Present Tense Verb Conjugation
Estonian verbs conjugate by person and number. To form the present tense of a verb, you need to remove the -ma ending of the verb and add the following:
- 1sg: -n
- 2sg: -d
- 3sg: -b
- 1pl: -me
- 2pl: -te
- 3pl: -vad
For example, conjugating the verb elama (to live) would look like:
- I live / Ma elan
- You (sg) live / Sa elad
- He/she lives / Ta elab
- We live / Me elame
- You (pl) live / Te elate
- They live / Nad elavad
Negation
To negate the verb in Estonian, you drop the -ma ending once again, and place ei before the verb:
- Not joke / Ei naljata
- Not live / Ei ela
- Not be / Ei ole
etc etc
"To Be" / "Olema"
The verb to be in Estonian is Olema. It forms present tense irregularly.
- I am / Ma olen
- You (sg) are / Sa oled
- He/she is / Ta on
- We are / Me oleme
- You (pl) are / Te olete
- They are / Nad on
The third person conjugation for to be is on NOT oleb and olevad.
Noun Declensions
Plurals
In Estonian, plurality is shown by putting de or te between the root of the noun and the case ending (only d or (s)id is used for nominative and partitive endings). De is attached to the root of a noun ending in a vowel, while te is attached to a root ending in a consonant.
| Example Declensions | ||
|---|---|---|
| Case | Singular | Plural |
| Nominative/Nimetav | Kala | Kalad |
| Auto | Autod | |
| Lammas | Lambad | |
| Kokk | Kokad | |
| Genitive/Omastav | Kala | Kalade |
| Auto | Autode | |
| Lamba | Lammaste | |
| Koka | Kokkade | |
| Partitive/Osastav | Kala | Kalasid/Kalu |
| Autot | Autosid | |
| Lammast | Lambaid | |
| Kokka | Kokkasid/Kokki | |
| Illative/Sisseütlev | Kalasse | Kaladesse |
| Autosse | Autodesse | |
| Lambasse | Lammastesse | |
| Kokasse/Kokka | Kokkadesse | |
Other Stuff
More informations about the case endings and it's usage at Timm's Estonian Page
Notes on partitive and genitive formations
In Estonian, there are 90 patterns for declining a noun. There is a dictionary that declines the nouns based on these patterns, for more than 100000 words. You can see it in this link:
For example, the word Sõnaraamat (dictionary) and the word raamat (book) both decline like this:
Sõnaraamat
Genitive - sõnaraamatu
Partitive - sõnaraamatut
Partitive plural - sõnaraamatuid
Raamat
Genitive - raamatu
Partitive - raamatut
Partitive plural - raamatuid
They both belong to the pattern lapsik:
Lapsik
Genitive - lapsiku
Partitive - lapsikut
Partitive plural - lapsikuid
The word keel (language) is of the same pattern as suur. They both decline like this:
Genitive - keele / suure
Partitive - keelt / suurt
Partitive plural - keelde / suurde
Now notice this: the word toit (food) is of the same pattern as kimp:
Genitive - kimbu
Partitive - kimpu
Partitive plural - kimpusid
In this pattern, the last consonant (voiceless) changes to a voiced consonant in the Genitive. As toit is of the same pattern as kimp, so it declines like this:
Genitive - toidu
Partitive - toitu
Partitive plural - toitusid
The word ilm (word) is of the same pattern as õrn. They both decline like this:
Genitive - ilma / õrna
Partitive - ilma / õrna
Partitive plural - ilmu / õrnu
Estonian Morphological Analyzer - decomposes the inflected Estonian words, showing its Nominative and the case it's representing. for example, keele --> keel+0 //_S_ sg g, //
Estonian dictionary - shows the inflection of more than 100000 Estonian words, based on 90 patterns of nouns and 200 patterns of verbs.
Estonian verb conjugator and noun declinator
Estonian-English Dictionary
Estonian Thesaurus
Learn Estonian Language - forum, chat, and more
Learn to Speak Estonian
Other Online Resources
