Breakdown of Vastasit, että huono sää pilasi festivaalin.
huono
bad
sää
the weather
että
that (conjunction)
vastata
to answer
festivaali
festival
pilata
to ruin
Questions & Answers about Vastasit, että huono sää pilasi festivaalin.
How do we form the past tense of vastata to get vastasit?
Vastata (to answer) is a Type 4 verb. The present tense stem is vastaa-. To make it past tense (imperfect), you replace the final -a- of the stem with the past tense marker -si-, giving you vastasi-. Finally, add the personal ending -t for you to make vastasit.
Why is the past tense of pilata just pilasi? Is there a missing ending?
Pilata (to ruin) is also a Type 4 verb. Just like before, we take the stem pilaa-, drop the last vowel, and add -si- to get the past stem pilasi-. Because the subject is huono sää (a third-person it), we don't add any extra personal ending. The stem pilasi is the complete word!
Why does festivaali have an -n at the end?
Festivaalin is the object of the sentence because it is the thing being ruined. In Finnish, when an action is fully completed to a whole object, we use the total object form. For singular nouns, this form looks exactly like the genitive case, which means we add an -n to the end.
I remember Type 4 verbs often have consonant changes. Why doesn't that happen here?
You are right that Type 4 verbs usually undergo consonant gradation! However, this only happens if there is a changeable consonant (like k, p, or t) in the root of the word. Since vastata and pilata don't have those specific consonants in the changeable spot, their stems (vastaa- and pilaa-) don't change.
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