Breakdown of Hän antoi lupauksen palata, mutta hänen aikomuksensa on jäädä Lontooseen.
olla
to be
hän
he / she
mutta
but
antaa
to give
Lontoo
London
jäädä
to stay
palata
to return
lupaus
promise
aikomus
intention
Questions & Answers about Hän antoi lupauksen palata, mutta hänen aikomuksensa on jäädä Lontooseen.
Why do lupaus and aikomus take the first infinitive (palata, jäädä)?
Abstract nouns like lupaus (promise) and aikomus (intention) often behave grammatically like the verbs they are derived from (luvata, aikoa). Because you use the basic dictionary form (1st infinitive) with the verbs—like hän aikoo jäädä (he intends to stay)—you also use the 1st infinitive after their noun equivalents: aikomus jäädä (the intention to stay).
Why is the object lupauksen in the genitive-looking accusative case rather than the partitive?
The verb antaa (to give) takes a total object when the action is complete and singular. Because he gave one specific, complete promise, the object takes the total object -n ending rather than the partitive.
Why do we use the illative case Lontooseen (into London) instead of the inessive Lontoossa (in London)?
This is a classic Finnish logic trap! In Finnish, the verb jäädä (to stay, to remain) is treated as a verb of motion towards a destination—you are "coming to a stop into" a place. Therefore, it always requires a directional case like the illative (-Vn / -hVn / -seen) or allative (-lle), never a stationary case.
How is the word aikomuksensa built?
It is the noun aikomus (intention) acting as the nominative subject of the second clause, plus the third-person possessive suffix -nsa (his/her). Notice that when adding a possessive suffix, words ending in -us change to their -ukse- stem, so aikomus + nsa becomes aikomuksensa.
Learn Hän antoi lupauksen palata, mutta hänen aikomuksensa on jäädä Lontooseen and more in Finnish
All course content and exercises are completely free — no paywalls, no trial periods, no signup needed.
- ✓ Practice with interactive exercises
- ✓ Track your progress with spaced repetition
- ✓Learn at your own pace — completely free