Breakdown of Olemme kolmestaan sermin takana marionettien kanssa.
olla
to be
takana
behind
kanssa
with
marionetti
marionette
kolmestaan
the three of us / the three of them
sermi
screen (room divider)
Questions & Answers about Olemme kolmestaan sermin takana marionettien kanssa.
Why is it kolmestaan and not kolmestamme, since the sentence says 'we' are?
Even though the subject is 'we', the suffix -staan has become a fixed adverbial ending in modern Finnish. While you might encounter kolmestamme in very formal text, kolmestaan is the standard for all persons (we, you, they) in everyday language to mean an exclusive group of three.
Where does the grammatical structure of kolmestaan come from?
It is built from the number kolme (three), the elative case ending -sta (out of), and the third-person possessive suffix -an. Literally, it hints at being formed 'out of three', but it functions as a fixed adverb for group size.
Both takana and kanssa are postpositions. Why do their preceding words look like that?
Most Finnish postpositions require their preceding noun to be in the genitive case. Sermin is the singular genitive of sermi (screen/room divider), and marionettien is the plural genitive of marionetti.
Why use takana here instead of taakse?
Takana expresses a static location, answering the question 'where?' (missä). Because we are already staying behind the screen, we use this static form. If we were moving to get behind it, we would use the directional form taakse.
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