Questions & Answers about Etsimme uusia ideoita noista vanhoista kirjoista.
Why do we use the elative case (-ista) for "from those old books" instead of the inessive (-issa, "in those old books")?
In Finnish, the verb etsiä (to look for / to search) requires the location you are searching to be in the elative case ("out of"). Even though in English we say we look "in" a book, in Finnish you search "out of" it.
Why does the ending -ista appear three times in a row in noista vanhoista kirjoista?
This is because of case agreement! In Finnish, adjectives (vanha) and demonstrative pronouns (nuo) must match the case and number of the noun they describe (kirja). So, "from those old books" becomes noista vanhoista kirjoista.
How do we get noista from the word for "those"?
The base word for "that" is tuo, and its plural ("those") is nuo. When you add the plural marker -i- and the elative ending -sta, the stem changes slightly to no-, giving us noista.
Why do the words vanha and kirja change their ending -a to an -o- before the plural ending?