Breakdown of Luolasto oli tutkittu, ja löydettyäni taikajuoman olin iloinen.
olla
to be
iloinen
happy
ja
and
löytää
to find
Questions & Answers about Luolasto oli tutkittu, ja löydettyäni taikajuoman olin iloinen.
How exactly is löydettyäni formed?
It is the past temporal construction, meaning "after I found". You take the passive past participle of löytää (which is löydetty), add the partitive ending (-ä because of vowel harmony), and finally attach the possessive suffix for "I" (-ni). So: löydetty + ä + ni = löydettyäni.
If löydetty is the passive participle, why does löydettyäni mean "after I found" instead of something passive?
This is a unique quirk of the past temporal construction! It always uses the passive past participle stem, even when the meaning is completely active. The "who did it" part is handled entirely by the possessive suffix at the end (in this case, -ni tells us "I" did the finding).
Why is the object taikajuoman in the genitive-like accusative case rather than the partitive?
Even though it is attached to a temporal construction rather than a finite verb, the rules for objects stay the same. Finding the potion was a complete, successful action. Therefore, it takes the total object case rather than the partitive.
The sentence starts with oli tutkittu. Is this related to the temporal construction?