Breakdown of Tislaamossa hiiva lisätään tuhanteen kiloon mallasta.
tuhat
one thousand
lisätä
to add
hiiva
yeast
kilo
kilogram
tislaamo
the distillery
mallas
the malt
Questions & Answers about Tislaamossa hiiva lisätään tuhanteen kiloon mallasta.
Why is mallasta in the partitive case when the phrase translates to 'into a thousand kilos'?
This is the rule for measure phrases. The unit (kilo) and its number (tuhat) take the case required by the verb. Here, it is the illative case (tuhanteen kiloon) because of the verb lisätä (to add into). The substance being measured acts as an uninflected partitive modifier and stays locked in the partitive case (mallasta) regardless of the main noun's case.
Why do we say tuhanteen kiloon instead of using the partitive for the noun after the number?
When a number phrase is the subject or object, the following noun takes the partitive singular (like tuhat kiloa). But when the phrase requires a local case like the illative here ('into'), both the number and the noun must agree and inflect into that same case. Thus, both tuhat and kilo take the illative endings.
Since hiiva (yeast) is the object being added, why isn't it in an object case like the accusative?
In standard Finnish, the total object of a passive verb (lisätään) is always in the nominative case rather than the genitive-looking accusative. Since the yeast is being added in its entirety in this context, it takes the nominative form hiiva.
How is the word tislaamossa (in the distillery) formed?
The base word is tislaamo (distillery). It is formed by taking the verb tislata (to distill) and adding the suffix -mo, which is frequently used to create nouns denoting a place where an action happens (similar to leipoa becoming leipomo, a bakery). The -ssa ending simply means 'in'.
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