Breakdown of Skandaali ei ollut kovin erikoinen.
olla
to be
ei
no / not (negative verb)
skandaali
the scandal
erikoinen
peculiar
kovin
very (intensifier)
Questions & Answers about Skandaali ei ollut kovin erikoinen.
How would we use the -pa/-pä clitic to add emphasis, like "The scandal surely wasn't very peculiar!"?
You would attach -pä to the negative verb ei, making it eipä, and move it to the front of the sentence. The emphatic clitic always attaches to the first word of the clause, so the sentence becomes: Eipä skandaali ollut kovin erikoinen. (We use the front-vowel version -pä because ei is treated as a front-vowel word).
Why use kovin for "very" here instead of a word like tosi?
While tosi (really/very) works grammatically, kovin is an extremely natural and common choice in negative sentences to express "not very" or "not particularly" (ei kovin).
Why is the verb ollut instead of the regular past tense oli?
This is a quick refresher on the negative past tense. To say someone or something "did not" do something, you combine the negative verb (ei) with the past participle form of the main verb (which ends in -nut/-nyt or -lut/-lyt). For olla (to be), that form is ollut. So "was" is oli, but "was not" is ei ollut.
How is the adjective erikoinen (peculiar) formed?
It is built from the common base word eri, which means "different" or "separate". Adding the suffix -koinen creates an adjective describing something that stands out from the rest, hence "special", "unusual", or "peculiar".
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