Breakdown of Ulkoministeriön mukaan sopimus on laillinen.
olla
to be
sopimus
contract
mukaan
according to
laillinen
legal
ulkoministeriö
ministry for foreign affairs
Questions & Answers about Ulkoministeriön mukaan sopimus on laillinen.
Why is ulkoministeriön in the genitive case here?
The word mukaan (according to) is a postposition. In Finnish, most postpositions require the noun that comes right before them to be in the genitive case. That is why ulkoministeriö gets the genitive -n ending.
Can I place mukaan before the noun, the way 'according to' works in English?
No, mukaan is strictly a postposition, so it must always come after the noun it modifies. While Finnish does have a few prepositions, mukaan is not one of them, so you cannot say mukaan ulkoministeriön.
How is the adjective laillinen (legal) formed?
It is derived from the noun laki (law). The suffix -llinen is a very common way to create adjectives meaning 'pertaining to' or 'having the quality of'. Notice how the stem changes: the k drops out due to consonant gradation when adding the suffix, turning the stem into lai-, resulting in laillinen.
What dictates the ö at the end of ulkoministeriö?
Vowel harmony. Even though the first part of this compound word (ulko-) has back vowels, vowel harmony applies independently to the individual parts of a compound word. The second part, ministeriö, only contains the neutral vowels i and e, so it takes the front vowel suffix -ö instead of the back vowel -o.
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