Breakdown of He eivät pese ikkunaa talossa.
talo
house
he
they
ei
no / not (en, et, ei, emme, ette, eivät)
pestä
to wash
ikkuna
window
Questions & Answers about He eivät pese ikkunaa talossa.
Why is the word for window ikkunaa instead of just ikkuna?
This is the main rule for negative sentences! Because they do not wash the window (eivät pese), the object of the action must be in the partitive case. To get the partitive, we add an -a to the end of ikkuna, making it ikkunaa.
Why isn't there a plural ending on the verb pese since the subject is 'they' (he)?
In Finnish, the negative word is actually a verb that changes depending on who is doing the action. Here, eivät carries the 'they' ending. When you use a negative verb, the main verb drops its personal endings and uses a neutral base form, which is just pese.
What does the -ssa ending on talossa do?
The -ssa ending means 'in' or 'inside' (a grammar concept known as the inessive case). It attaches directly to the word for house (talo) to make talossa, meaning 'in the house'.
Why did we add an -a to ikkuna to make it partitive, instead of an -ä?
This is due to vowel harmony. The word ikkuna contains the back vowels i, u, and a. Because u and a are back vowels, the word's endings must also use back vowels. That is why we use -a to make ikkunaa instead of -ä.
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