Breakdown of Luulin ideaa nerokkaaksi, mutta se oli huono.
olla
to be
se
it / he / she (of a person) / that
mutta
but
huono
bad
idea
idea
luulla
to think, to suppose
nerokas
ingenious
Questions & Answers about Luulin ideaa nerokkaaksi, mutta se oli huono.
Why does this sentence use the translative case for nerokkaaksi?
In Finnish, the verb luulla (to think, suppose, or mistakenly believe) triggers a specific sentence structure: luulla + partitive object (ideaa) + translative adjective (nerokkaaksi). It is the standard way to express that you assumed something to be a certain way.
Since this lesson is also about the verb pitää, how would the sentence look if I used pitää instead?
If you used pitää (to hold an opinion), the adjective would take the essive case (-na/-nä): Pidin ideaa nerokkaana. However, luulla is the perfect choice for this specific sentence because it strongly implies that your initial assumption turned out to be wrong!
Why does nerokas (ingenious) change to nerokkaaksi with a double 'k'?
Words ending in -kas or -käs have a special stem where the 'k' doubles and the final 's' becomes a long vowel before most case endings. The stem of nerokas is nerokkaa-, and then you simply add the translative ending -ksi.
Why is huono in the basic nominative case rather than the partitive?
In the clause se oli huono, the pronoun se refers back to idea. Because an idea is a singular, countable concept, the adjective describing it with the verb olla (to be) must be in the nominative case. If it were describing an uncountable mass noun, you would use the partitive.
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