Breakdown of Käännätimme asiakirjan englanniksi.
asiakirja
document
englanti
English (the language)
käännättää
to have translated
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Questions & Answers about Käännätimme asiakirjan englanniksi.
How is käännätimme formed from the base verb kääntää?
To form this curative verb, you take the weak stem of kääntää (to translate), which is käännä-, and add the suffix -ttää to get käännättää (to have translated). Adding the past tense -i- and the first-person plural ending -mme gives us 'we had it translated'.
Why does käännätimme only have one t before the i if the suffix is -ttää?
The verb käännättää is a Type 1 verb, meaning its stem undergoes consonant gradation when a suffix closes the syllable. The ending -mme closes the syllable, so the strong tt from the curative suffix weakens to a single t. If it were a third-person singular past, the syllable would remain open and keep the double consonant: hän käännätti.
Why is the object asiakirjan in the accusative (genitive shape) rather than the partitive?
The accusative case is used here to indicate a total object and a completed action. It shows that we had the entire document translated from start to finish, rather than just a portion of the text or an ongoing process.
Why does the language englanniksi take the translative (-ksi) case?
The translative case expresses a change of state or form. In Finnish, whenever you translate or change a text into another language, the target language must always take the -ksi ending to reflect this transformation.