Breakdown of Me mentiin eilen poliisin luokse.
me
we
mennä
to go
poliisi
the police / police officer
eilen
yesterday
luokse
to someone's place
Questions & Answers about Me mentiin eilen poliisin luokse.
Why does this sentence use mentiin instead of the standard past tense menimme?
In spoken and colloquial Finnish, it is extremely common to use the pronoun me together with the passive form of the verb to express what we did. Because the sentence is in the past tense, it uses the past passive form mentiin rather than the standard active past menimme.
Why is the word poliisi in the genitive case (poliisin) here?
It is required by the postposition luokse, which means to or to the place of someone. Most Finnish postpositions require the noun preceding them to be in the genitive case.
Could I just use the illative case and say poliisiin instead of poliisin luokse?
No, because poliisiin would literally mean going inside a police officer, or joining the police force. When going to visit a person or a professional, you use luokse. If you wanted to specify traveling to the building itself, you would use the allative case and say poliisiasemalle (to the police station).
How would I apply this lesson's grammar to say 'We probably didn't go to the police yesterday'?
In standard Finnish, you would say Me emme liene menneet eilen poliisin luokse. This uses the negative verb emme, the potential auxiliary liene, and the active plural past participle menneet. Because the original sentence is colloquial, a native speaker might instead use the colloquial passive construction Me ei liene menty, but the standard active perfect negative potential is emme liene menneet.
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