Estonian grammar is the grammar of the Estonian language.
Estonian consonant gradation is a grammatical process that affects obstruent consonants at the end of the stressed syllable of a word. Gradation causes consonants in a word to alternate between two grades, termed "strong" and "weak", depending on the grammar. Some grammatical forms trigger the weak grade, while others retain the strong grade. It is not predictable which form will have which grade; this must simply be memorised. Not all words show gradation. In particular, words with stems of three or more syllables generally do not gradate, nor do words with stems of one syllable.
Gradation correlates with the appearance of extra length on a syllable. When a syllable is long, the strong grade will always be accompanied by extra length. The weak grade may or may not have extra length, depending on other factors. These are mentioned at Estonian phonology – Suprasegmental length. Some words show gradation only through the presence or absence of extra length, and the consonants themselves do not change. In this article, extra length is shown with a backtick ` before the vowel of the syllable.
The gradation patterns of geminate (long) consonants are relatively simple:
| Strong | Weak | Example |
|---|---|---|
| pp | p | s`epp: sepa |
| tt | t | v`õtta: võtan |
| kk | k | h`akkama: hakata |
| p | b | k`upja: kubjas, k`ilp: kilbi |
| t | d | s`aatev: saadan, k`artma: kardan |
| k | g | v`ilkuma: vilgun |
| ss | s | k`irss: kirsi |
Patterns for single plosives are more varied and unpredictable. The weak grade may involve disappearance of the consonant altogether, with further consequences for vowels and extra length.
| Strong | Weak | Example | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| b | v | k`aebama: kaevata | |
| ∅ | tuba: t`oa | When next to u. | |
| d, t | ∅ | `aed: aia, l`eht: lehe | Voiceless t appears in the cluster ht. |
| j | rada: raja | When followed by a and preceded by a short vowel other than e or i. | |
| g, k | ∅ | `arg: ara, lugema: l`oen, h`ahk: haha | Voiceless k appears in the clusters hk and sk. |
| j | m`ärg: märja | When followed by a or e and preceded by l or r which is preceded by e, ä or ü. |
There are also four special assimilative patterns:
| Strong | Weak | Example |
|---|---|---|
| mb | mm | h`amba: hammas |
| nd | nn | k`andma: kannan |
| ld | ll | p`õld: põllu |
| rd | rr | k`ord: korra |
When a consonant is reduced to zero in the weak grade, this may cause the vowels of the two adjacent syllables to come together. These vowels undergo several changes:
Assibilation is a change that happened in Proto-Finnic: the sequence ti became si. This change is no longer productive or predictable, but a fair number of nouns still display the effects in certain forms. The effect is visible in that sometimes s appears where there would otherwise be a t or d. This also creates new variants of the gradation patterns mentioned above, with s appearing in some of the forms in both the strong and weak grade.
For example:
| Case | Singular ending | Plural ending | Meaning/use | Answers to question; notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Basic/grammatical cases | ||||
| Nominative | ∅ (with or without vowel) | -d | Subject, object of imperative, (in plural) complete (telic) object | Who? What? |
| Genitive | ∅ (with vowel) | -de/-te | Possession, relation, (in singular) complete (telic) object | Whose? His?/Hers? |
| Partitive | -d, -t, ∅ (with vowel) | -id, -sid, ∅ (modified vowel) | Partial object, indefinite amount | Whom? Him?/Her? |
| Interior ("in") locative cases | ||||
| Illative | -sse, -∅ (with vowel) | -desse/-tesse, -isse | In, into | Whither? |
| Inessive | -s | -des/-tes, -is | In, inside | Wherein? |
| Elative | -st | -dest/-test, -ist | Out of | Whence? |
| Exterior ("on") locative cases | ||||
| Allative | -le | -dele/-tele, -ile | Towards, onto | Whither? |
| Adessive | -l | -del/-tel, -il | At, on, upon | Whereon?, on top of |
| Ablative | -lt | -delt/-telt, -ilt | From, off | Whereof?, off of |
| Other cases | ||||
| Translative | -ks | -deks/-teks, -iks | Becoming, turning into | |
| Terminative | -ni | -deni/-teni | Till, until, up to, towards (a person, a thing) | |
| Essive | -na | -dena/-tena | Being, acting as, as people/things | |
| Abessive | -ta | -deta/-teta | Without, lacking, bereft of | |
| Comitative | -ga | -dega/-tega | With, in company of, in combination with | |
Inflectional endings as listed below are added to the stem of a noun, which is formed from:
Singular nominative, singular genitive and singular partitive are not predictable and have to be taken from the vocabulary (gradation may also apply).
Singular genitive always ends in vowel. When formed from a stem that ends in consonant, it can take the following endings: -a, -e, -i, -o, -u.
Singular partitive can take the following endings: -d, -t, -a, -e, -i, -u.
Plural partitive is formed from either singular genitive or singular partitive and can take the following endings (some words have two forms):
Singular illative has a short form in some words. It can take the following endings: -de, -he, -hu, -a, -e, -i, -u. In case it takes the vowel ending, this vowel is the same as the ending vowel of the singular genitive form of the given word, but the vowel (if it is already long or a diphthong) or its preceding consonant (if the vowel is short and the consonant either short or long) is lengthened to the third degree and thus becomes overlong. If illative ends with -sesse, then the short form is -sse.
Plural illative, inessive, elative, allative, adessive, ablative, translative have a short form in some words. If the plural partitive ends with -id, then the short plural stem is this form without -d (instead of plural genitive with -de-); if it ends with a vowel, then the short plural stem is this form; if it ends with -sid, then the short plural cannot be formed.
Emphasis: noun + -gi (after a final voiced consonant or vowel) / -ki (after a final voiceless consonant).
New nouns can be derived from existing nouns, adjectives and verbs using suffixes like -ja (agent, from -ma infinitive), -mine (gerund, from -ma infinitive), -la, -nna, -tar, -ur, -stik, -ndik, -nik, -ik, -k, -ng, -lane, -line, -kene, -ke, -e, -ndus, -dus, -us, -is, -kond, -nd, -istu, -u.
| 1 | 2 | 3 | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| singular | nominative | m(in)a | s(in)a | t(em)a |
| genitive | m(in)u | s(in)u | t(em)a | |
| partitive | mind | sind | teda | |
| plural | nominative | m(ei)e | t(ei)e | n(em)ad |
| genitive | m(ei)e | t(ei)e | nende | |
| partitive | meid | teid | neid | |
There are traditionally considered to be 14 noun cases in Estonian: [1]
| # | Case | Singular | Plural | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Example in Estonian | Example in English | Example in Estonian | Example in English | ||
| 1 | Nominative | ilus raamat | a beautiful book | ilusad raamatud | beautiful books (as subject or total object) |
| 2 | Genitive | ilusa raamatu | of a beautiful book; a beautiful book (as total object) | ilusate raamatute | of beautiful books; |
| 3 | Partitive | ilusat raamatut | a beautiful book (as a partial object) | ilusaid raamatuid | beautiful books (as a partial object) |
| 4 | Illative | ilusasse raamatusse | into a beautiful book | ilusatesse raamatutesse | into beautiful books |
| 5 | Inessive | ilusas raamatus | in a beautiful book | ilusates raamatutes | in beautiful books |
| 6 | Elative | ilusast raamatust | from a beautiful book | ilusatest raamatutest | from beautiful books |
| 7 | Allative | ilusale raamatule | onto a beautiful book | ilusatele raamatutele | onto beautiful books |
| 8 | Adessive | ilusal raamatul | on a beautiful book | ilusatel raamatutel | on beautiful books |
| 9 | Ablative | ilusalt raamatult | off a beautiful book | ilusatelt raamatutelt | off beautiful books |
| 10 | Translative | ilusaks raamatuks | [to turn] (in)to a beautiful book | ilusateks raamatuteks | [to turn] (in)to beautiful books |
| 11 | Terminative | ilusa raamatuni | up to a beautiful book | ilusate raamatuteni | up to beautiful books |
| 12 | Essive | ilusa raamatuna | as a beautiful book | ilusate raamatutena | as beautiful books |
| 13 | Abessive | ilusa raamatuta | without a beautiful book | ilusate raamatuteta | without beautiful books |
| 14 | Comitative | ilusa raamatuga | with a beautiful book | ilusate raamatutega | with beautiful books |
Locative cases make up six or eight of these fourteen (depending on interpretation).
There are also some additional cases such as the instructive (jalgsi, "by foot"; käsitsi, "by hand"), [2] or the similarly formed prolative (meritsi, "by the way of the sea"), which are not traditionally counted among the 14 grammatical cases.
Inflectional endings are added to the stem of an adjective, which is formed like the one for nouns. However, adjectives do not have terminative, essive, abessive, and comitative cases.
| Type | |
|---|---|
| Degree | General |
| Positive | – |
| Comparative | -m |
| Superlative | -im / kõige -m |
The stem for the comparative and superlative forms is the singular genitive of an adjective; if a word has two syllables in the genitive or a vowel following -ke(se), then -ke(se) is left out and the last vowel in the stem changes to -e. The genitive and the partitive of the comparative itself are formed with -a and -at.
New adjectives can be derived from existing words by means of suffixes like:
Antonyms can be formed by attaching eba- or mitte to an adjective. Eba- is considered to be the only derivational prefix in Estonian; as mitte can also occur as a separate word, mitte + adjective can be regarded as a compound rather than derivative. Alternatively, for an adjective formed from a noun or a verb, an antonym can often be constructed using the suffix -tu or -matu.
Estonian has no definite and indefinite articles. The function of the definite article can be performed by the demonstrative pronoun see ‘this’; and the function of the indefinite article can be performed by the indefinite pronoun üks, developed from the numeral ‘one’. (Pajusalu 2001) [3]
See
this
elu
life
on
be.3SG
vaid
only
vaev
trouble
ja
and
viletsus.
misery
‘Life is only trouble and misery.’
Siia
here.ILL
pidi
must:PAST.3SG
üks
one
maja
house
tulema.
come:MINF
‘It is said that a house will be built here.‘
Adjectival modifiers (including ordinals, demonstratives, and present participles) agree with their heads in case and number. In the terminative, essive, abessive, and comitative the modifier agrees only in number and remains in the genitive. See Case table above.
Most modifiers occur in the pre-noun position:
Post-noun substantive modifiers take the form of various kinds of adverbials, e.g. uks eluruumidesse ‘the door to dwelling rooms’,sõit linna ‘the drive to town’, vestlus sõpradega ‘conversation with friends’, mure laste pärast ‘worry about children’, tagatis eduks ‘key to success’, etc.
| Case | Singular "big man" | Plural "big men" |
|---|---|---|
| Nominative | suur mees | suured mehed |
| Genitive | suure mehe | suurte meeste |
| Partitive | suurt meest | suuri mehi |
| Illative | suuresse mehesse | suurtesse meestesse |
| Inessiv(e) | suures mehes | suurtes meestes |
| Elative | suurest mehest | suurtest meestest |
| Allative | suurele mehele | suurtele meestele |
| Adessive | suurel mehel | suurtel meestel |
| Ablative | suurelt mehelt | suurtelt meestelt |
| Translative | suureks meheks | suurteks meesteks |
| Terminative | suure meheni | suurte meesteni |
| Essive | suure mehena | suurte meestena |
| Abessive | suure meheta | suurte meesteta |
| Comitative | suure mehega | suurte meestega |
The non-agreement of the last four cases in Estonian is the manifestation of the postpositionality of the affixes of the above cases. Postpositionality implies that there is no need to repeat the case endings in coordinated phrases, e.g. naise(ga) ja mehega ‘with a man and a woman’. The above affixes were treated as postpositions in earlier grammars, and some grammarians still follow this tradition. Only the comitative evolved directly from a postposition; the other cases followed suit.
The following lists are not exhaustive.
The inflectional endings as listed below are added to the stem of a verb, which is formed from:
Present tense form and -tud participle are derived from the infinitives on the basis of gradation.
-ma infinitive indicates real action, i.e. action that does happen, has happened, or will happen. It can be declined: -ma (illative), -mas (inessive), -mast (elative), -maks (translative), -mata (abessive). The verb that precedes it also usually implies real action: harjunud lugema ‘accustomed to reading’, lähen lugema ‘I go to read’, käib vaatamas ‘goes looking’, olen valmis/nõus aitama ‘I am ready/in agreement to help’, saan hakkama ‘I can manage’.
-da infinitive indicates hypothetical action, i.e. the idea of the action rather than real action. It can be declined: -des (inessive). It is used in the following cases:
The following suffixes add meaning to a stem.
| I | II | III | IV | V | VI | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| ma-infinitive | elama | õppima | hüppama | riidlema | söötma | tulema | |
| Past | 1st singular | elasin | õppisin | hüppasin | riidlesin | söötsin | tulin |
| 3rd singular | elas | õppis | hüppas | riidles | söötis | tuli | |
| tud-participle | elatud | õpitud | hüpatud | riieldud | söödetud | tuldud | |
| Present passive | elatakse | õpitakse | hüpatakse | riieldakse | söödetakse | tullakse | |
| da-infinitive | elada | õppida | hüpata | riielda | sööta | tulla | |
| Imperative | 2nd plural | elage | õppige | hüpake | riielge | söötke | tulge |
| Tense | |||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Present | Imperfect | Perfect | Pluperfect | ||||||||
| Mood | Voice | Number | Person | Positive | Negative | Positive | Negative | Positive | Negative | Positive | Negative |
| Indicative | |||||||||||
| Active | |||||||||||
| Singular | First | -n | ei – | -sin | ei -nud | olen -nud | ei ole -nud | olin -nud | ei olnud -nud | ||
| Second | -d | -sid | oled -nud | olid -nud | |||||||
| Third | -b | -s | on -nud | oli -nud | |||||||
| Plural | First | -me | -sime | oleme -nud | olime -nud | ||||||
| Second | -te | -site | olete -nud | olite -nud | |||||||
| Third | -vad | -sid | on -nud | olid -nud | |||||||
| Passive | / | -takse | ei -ta | -ti | ei -tud | on -tud | ei ole -tud | oli -tud | ei olnud -tud | ||
| Conditional | |||||||||||
| Active | |||||||||||
| Singular | First | -ksin | ei -ks | / | oleksin -nud | ei oleks -nud | / | ||||
| Second | -ksid | oleksid -nud | |||||||||
| Third | -ks | oleks -nud | |||||||||
| Plural | First | -ksime | oleksime -nud | ||||||||
| Second | -ksite | oleksite -nud | |||||||||
| Third | -ksid | oleksid -nud | |||||||||
| Passive | / | -taks | ei -taks | oleks -tud | ei oleks -tud | ||||||
| Imperative | |||||||||||
| Active | |||||||||||
| Singular | Second | – | ära – | / | / | / | |||||
| Third | -gu | ärgu -gu | olgu -nud | ärgu olgu -nud | |||||||
| Plural | First | -gem | ärgem -gem | / | |||||||
| Second | -ge | ärge -ge | |||||||||
| Third | -gu | ärgu -gu | olgu -nud | ärgu olgu -nud | |||||||
| Passive | / | -tagu | ärgu -tagu | olgu -tud | ärgu olgu -tud | ||||||
| Quotative | |||||||||||
| Active | / | -vat | ei -vat | / | olevat -nud | ei olevat -nud | / | ||||
| Passive | / | -tavat | ei -tavat | olevat -tud | ei olevat -tud | ||||||
Emphasis: verb + -gi (after a final voiced consonant or vowel) / -ki (after a final voiceless consonant), verb + küll (positive), verb + mitte (negative).
Inflectional endings as listed below are added to the stem of an adverb, which is formed from:
Some adverbs are special words – original or vestigial forms of an ancient instructive case.
| Type | ||
|---|---|---|
| Degree | Genetival | Ablatival |
| Positive | – | -lt |
| Comparative | -mini | -malt |
| Superlative | kõige -mini | kõige -malt |
The neutral word order in Estonian is subject–verb–object (SVO).
However, as one would expect from an agglutinative language, the word order is quite free and non-neutral word order can be used to stress some parts of the sentence or in poetic texts, as in Finnish grammar. For example, consider the sentence mees tappis karu which means ‘(a/the) man killed (a/the) bear’ and uses the neutral SVO word order. The sentence can be rephrased using OVS word order as karu tappis mees—a normal Estonian sentence that could be more precisely translated as ‘it was (a/the) man who killed the bear’, i. e., the speaker emphasizes that the killer was a man, probably assuming the listener knows that a bear was killed. The other four word orders (tappis mees karu, tappis karu mees, mees karu tappis, karu mees tappis) are also possible in certain contexts, especially if more words are added to the three-word sentences. The following data (4–24, 50–72) are sourced from (Tauli, 1983) [5] and (Erelt, 2009) [6] at the University of Tartu.
Sometimes the forms of verbs, nouns and adjectives in the sentence are not enough to determine the subject and object, e. g. mehed tapsid karud (‘the men killed the bears’) or isa tappis karu (‘father killed the bear’)—in the first sentence because in plural, the nominative case is used in Estonian both for subject and telic object, and in the second sentence because in singular, the nominative, genitive and partitive forms of the word isa are the same, as well as those of the word karu (unlike the word mees which has different forms: sg. nom. mees, sg. gen. mehe, sg. part. meest). In such sentences, word order is the only thing that distinguishes the subject and the object: the listener presumes that the former noun (mehed, isa) is the subject and the latter (karud, karu) is the object. In such situations, the speaker cannot interchange the subject and the object for emphasis (unless it is obvious from the context which noun is the subject).
There are two basic patterns of clauses in Estonian: normal and inverted clauses (cf. also Erelt 2003, [7] 2005a [8] ). In a normal clause the basic word order is SVX (subject – verb – nonsubject). The subject is unmarked, that is, it stands in the nominative, and the verb usually agrees with the subject in person and number. An inverted clause has the word order XVS. The clause opens not with the subject but with an adverbial or oblique, experiential clauses with an object in exceptional cases. If there is a subject-NP in the clause, it is usually indefinite. If the subject-NP is a mass noun or a count noun in the plural, quantitative indefiniteness may be optionally marked by the partitive. (5,7) In the (non-contrastive) negative clause the use of the partitive is obligatory, (e.g. ex. 8). In clauses without a nominative subject the verb is always in the 3rd person singular. In the inverted clause olema ‘be’ is the most common verb. The main types of inverted clauses include existential, possessive, experiential clauses, clauses of state and source-marking resultative clauses. In existential clauses, as in (4)–(8), the clause-initial constituent is an adverbial of location (or time), and the clause performs a presentative function. In possessive clauses the possessor is expressed as a locative phrase. The latter is represented by the nominal in the adessive case (9).
Aias
garden:INE
olid
be:PAST:3PL
/
/
kasvasid
grow:PAST:3PL
lilled.
flower:PL.NOM
‘Flowers were / were growing in the garden.’
Aias
garden:INE
oli
be:PAST.3SG
/
/
kasvas
grow:PAST.3SG
lilli.
flower.PL.PTV
lit. ‘There were / were growing some flowers in the garden.’
Klaasis
glass:INE
oli
be:PAST.3SG
/
/
loksus
slosh:PAST.3SG
vesi.
water.NOM
‘Some water was sloshing in the glass.’
Klaasis
glass:INE
oli
be:PAST.3SG
/
/
loksus
slosh:PAST.3SG
vett.
water.PTV
‘Some water was sloshing in the glass.’
Aias
garden:INE
ei
NEG
olnud
be:PPP
/
/
ei
neg
kasvanud
grow:PPP
lilli.
flower.PL.PTV
‘There were no flowers / no flowers were growing in the garden.’
The possessor is typically animate, as in (9), but it may be also inanimate, as in Autol on neli ratast ‘The car has four wheels’. Estonian makes no distinction in the expression of permanent and temporal possession. Occasionally, possessive constructions may be formed according to the model of normal clauses, that is, encoding the possessor as the subject and using a special verb, such as omama, evima ‘have’ (10). The frequency of the construction is on the increase. The pattern of the normal clause is also used to form the belong-possession, using the olema-verb and the genitive possessor together with the pronoun oma ‘one’s own’ (11) or the special kuuluma-verb ‘belong’ (12). Experiential clauses can be formed according to the pattern of possessive clauses, so that the experiencer is expressed by the clause-initial oblique in the adessive, and the ‘possessed’ state is expressed by the subject-NP, as in (13). This kind of state can be expressed also by the predicate adjective (14).
Jaanil
Jaan:ADE
on
be.3SG
vend.
brother.NOM
‘Jaan has a brother.’
Jaan
Jaan
omab/evib
have:3SG
autot.
car:PTV
‘Jaan has a car.’
See
this
auto
car
on
be.3SG
Jaani
Jaan.GEN
oma.
own
‘This car belongs to Jaan.’
See
this
auto
car
kuulub
belong:3SG
Jaanile.
Jaan:ALL
‘This car belongs to Jaan.’
Jaanil
Jaan.ADE
oli
be:PAST.3SG
/
/
hakkas
become:PAST.3SG
hirm.
fear.NOM
‘Jaan was/became afraid.’
Jaanil
Jaan:ADE
oli
be:PAST.3SG
/
/
hakkas
become:PAST.3SG
piinlik.
embarrassing.NOM
‘Jaan was/became embarrassed.’
The inverted clause pattern is also used in the case of some experiential verbs. In the case of some of them (e.g. meeldima ‘like’) the experiencer has to be encoded as the allative oblique (15), in others (huvitama ‘take an interest in’, hämmastama ‘amaze’, etc.) as the direct object in the partitive case (16). Most experiential verbs take a nominative experiencer, that is, the normal clause pattern, as in (17). In clauses of “state” the clause-initial adverbial of location or time is optional. The predicate may be nominal, as in (18, 19), or verbal (20). The “source-marking resultative clause” (Erelt 2005b [9] ) is a marginal type of the resultative clause, where not the resultant state (goal) is marked, as in the normal resultative clause (22), but an entity that changes its state (21).
Siimule
Siim:ALL
meeldivad
like:3PL
lapsed.
child:PL.NOM
‘Siim loves children.’
Mind
I:PTV
huvitab
interest:3SG
teie
you.GEN
arvamus.
opinion.NOM
‘I’m interested in your opinion.’
Ma
I.NOM
armastan
love:1SG
sind.
you:PTV
‘I love you.’
Väljas
outside
on
be.3SG
kõva
strong.NOM
tuul.
wind.NOM
‘Outside the wind is strong.’
(Väljas)
outside
on
be.3SG
külm
cold.NOM
/
/
läheb
get:3SG
külmaks.
cold:TRANSL
‘It’s cold outside/it is getting cold.’
(Väljas)
outside
müristab.
thunder:3SG
‘It’s thundering outside.’
Poisist
boy.ELA
kasvas
grow:PAST.3SG
mees.
man.NOM
‘The boy grew into a man.’
Poiss
boy.NOM
kasvas
grow:PAST.3SG
meheks.
man:TRANSL
‘The boy grew into a man.’
Isa
father
viis
take:PAST.3SG
last
child:PTV
kooli.
school.ILL
‘The father was taking the child to school.’
Isa
father
viis
take:PAST.3SG
lapse/lapsed
child.GEN/PL.NOM
kooli.
school.ILL
‘The father took the child/children to school.
The Estonian language has no secondary or indirect object. A direct object can be in the partitive (partial object) (23), or in the genitive or nominative (total object) (24). In the affirmative clause the total object refers to definite quantity and the clause expresses a perfective activity. If at least one of the conditions is not met, the partitive is used, for example, clause (23) denotes an imperfective activity; the clause Ta jõi vett ja hakkas siis sööma ‘He drank some water and then started to eat’ denotes a perfective activity but an indefinite quantity. In the negative clause only the partial object can be used, e.g. Isa ei viinud last kooli ‘The father didn’t take the child to school’. Some verbs, such as the verbs of cognition, only take the partial object also in the affirmative, e.g. Isa armastab lapsi ‘Father loves children’. The total object in Estonian does not express the perfective aspect as strongly as in the Finnish language, and for this reason perfective adverbs are often used along with it. The total object is predominantly in the genitive. The nominative is used if the object is in the plural as in (24) or if there is (normally) no subject in the clause, and the object happens to be the most central argument in the clause, i.e. if the verb is in the imperative mood, e.g. Vii laps kooli! ‘Take the child to school!’, impersonal, e.g. Laps viiakse kooli ‘The child is taken to school’, or the da-infinitive (except cases where the da-infinitive acts also as the object), e.g. Isa ülesanne oli laps kooli viia ‘The father’s task was to take the child to school’ Measure adverbials behave similarly to the object in that they occur in the nominative/genitive or the partitive roughly under similar circumstances, e.g. Ta suusatas viis [nom] kilomeetrit / ühe [gen] kilomeetri ‘He skied five kilometres / one kilometre’ – Ta ei suusatanud ühte [part] kilomeetritki ‘He didn’t ski not a single kilometre’; Ootasin pool [nom] tundi / ühe [gen] tunni ‘I waited for half an hour / an hour’ – Ma ei oodanud ühte [part] minutitki ‘I didn’t wait even a minute’.
The basic word order in the normal clause is SVX, and in the inverted clause it is XVS. The word order is flexible, that is, pragmatic order variants are allowed in addition to the basic order. However, one can observe the following trends in the location of the verb. In non-negated declarative main clauses the finite verb tends to retain the second position in all the thematic variants (50–51) (cf. Tael 1990, [10] Ehala 2006 [11] ). The verb can be located at the end of the clause in negative clauses if the clause does not begin with the subject (52), in questions (53), and in some subordinate clauses (54). The positioning of the verb at the beginning of the clause and the resulting inversion can mark a speech act function (55)–(58) or can be used in narrative texts rendering past activities, e.g. (59) (cf. Lindström 2001b [12] ).
Meie
our
pere
family
S
joob
drink:3SG
V
hommikukohvi
morning_coffee.PTV
O
kodus.
home:INE
A
Hommikukohvi
morning_coffee.PTV
O
joob
drink.3SG
V
meie
our
pere
family
S
kodus.
home:INE
A
‘Our family drinks morning coffee at home.’
Kodus
home:INE
ma
I
hommikul
morning:ADE
putru
pudding.PTV
ei
neg
söö.
eat.NEGV
‘At home I don’t eat pudding.’
Kuidas
how
te
you
hommikul
morning:ADE
nii
so
ruttu
quickly
siia
here.ILL
jõudsite?
get:PAST:2PL
‘How did you get here so quickly in the morning?’
Ma
I
tunnen
know:1SG
seda
this:PTV
meest,
man:PTV
kellega
who:COM
Jaan
Jaan
rääkis.
talk:PAST.3SG
‘I know the man that Jaan talked to.’
On
be.3SG
ema
mother
kodus?
home:INE
‘Is the mother at home?’
Käi
go.imp.2SG
sa
you
vahepeal
meanwhile
kodus
home:INE
ära!
away
‘Go home in the meanwhile!’
Läheks
go:COND
nad
they
ometi
at_last
minema!
away
‘If only they would leave at last!’
Oled
be:2SG
sina
you
alles
so
tubli!
diligent
‘How come you’re so diligent!
Istun
sit:1SG
mina
I
eile
yesterday
oma
own
kabinetis
study:INE
ja
and
kirjutan
write:1SG
aruannet.
report:PTV
‘Yesterday I was sitting in my study and writing the report.’
Polar questions are formed by means of the clause-initial interrogative particles kas (60) or ega (in negative clauses, as in [61]), verb fronting (62), or rising intonation (63). In spoken language questions can be formed also by the clause-final particle või, which developed from the disjunctive conjunction (64) (cf. Lindström 2001a [13] ). Questions begin with an interrogative word (interrogative pro-forms or kas (yes/no-question), eks (yes-question), ega (no-question)), followed by the SVO word order (in spoken language, interrogative words are sometimes left out, but instead there is either a change in intonation or VSO word order); answers: jah/jaa (yes), ei (no). An adjective precedes the noun it modifies. An adverb of time precedes an adverb of place.
Content questions are formed by means of interrogative pronouns and pro-adverbs, which are positioned at the beginning of the sentence (64, 65)(WH-fronting):
Kas
Q
sa
you
tuled
come:2SG
täna
today
koju?
home.ILL
‘Will you come home today?’
Ega
NEG.Q
sa
you
(ei)
(NEG)
tule
come.NEGV
täna
today
koju?
home.ILL
‘Won’t you come home today?’
On
be.3SG
sul
you:ADE
täna
today
aega?
time.PTV
‘Do you have any time today?’
Sa
you
armastad
love:2SG
mind?
I:PTV
‘Do you love me?’
Ta
s/he
läks
leave:PAST.3SG
ära
away
või?
or
‘Did s/he leave or?’
Kes
who
sa
you
oled?
be:2SG
‘Who are you?’
Kuhu
where
te
you.PL
lähete?
go:2PL
‘Where are you going?’
Clausal negation in Estonian is expressed by means of the negative particle ei, which usually precedes the verb, e.g. (67). The particle ei is historically the 3sg form of the previous negative auxiliary. Standard clausal negation is asymmetric, that is, the structure of the negative construction differs from the affirmative not only by the presence of the negative particle but in various other ways, too, first and foremost by the non-finiteness of the main verb (Miestamo 2000). [14] In Estonian the main verb does not carry inflections of the person and the number appearing in the connegative form in the present and in the past participle in the past (see example [67]). The other secondary modifications of standard negation include changes in case marking and word order. In a negative clause direct objects appear only in the partitive case. In the case of the inverted type of clause the same applies to the subject (cf. 2). The connegative form of the verb may be located at the end of the clause in negative clauses (cf. 6). In the imperative and the jussive prohibition is expressed by the partially inflected negative auxiliary ära (2sg), ärge (2pl), ärgem (1pl), ärgu (3sg/pl) together with the imperative form of the main verb (68). Unlike the negative particle ei, the auxiliary verb ära may be separated from the main verb by other words (69). In the case of constituent negation the scope of negation is marked by emphasis and optionally by the negative particle mitte (70, 71). The particle is placed immediately before the negated constituents, whereas the verb is optionally (but in the case of negated indefinites obligatorily) also in the negative form. The particle mitte is also used to express negation within an infinitive clause (72).
Täna
today
ajalehed
newspaper:PL
ei
NEG
ilmu/ilmunud.
appear:NEGV.PPP
‘Today newspapers are not/were not published.’
On DO Fronting:
Ära
IMP.NEG
tee
make.IMP.2SG
rumalusi!
stupid_thing.PL.PTV
‘Don’t act stupid!’
Ära
IMP.NEG
homme
tomorrow
tule!
come.IMP.2SG
‘Don’t come tomorrow!’
Constituent negation:
See
it
ei
NEG
ole
be.NEGV
/
/
see
it
on
be.3SG
(mitte)
(NEG)
raha,
money
vaid
but
tunnustus.
recognition
‘It is not the money but recognition.’
Mind
I:PTV
ei
NEG
häiri
disturb.NEGV
(*häirib)
(*disturb:3SG)
(mitte)
(NEG)
miski.
something
‘Nothing can disturb me.’
Palun
beg:1SG
teid
you:PTV
mitte
NEG
karjuda!
shout:DINF
‘Don’t shout please!’
See Adjectival Agreement.
The partitive case is a grammatical case which denotes "partialness", "without result", or "without specific identity". It is also used in contexts where a subgroup is selected from a larger group, or with numbers.
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