Questions & Answers about Asteroido orbitas la sunon.
What does each word in Asteroido orbitas la sunon do grammatically?
Asteroido is a noun and the subject. The ending -o marks it as a noun. Orbitas is the verb, and -as shows present tense. La sunon is the direct object: la means the, and sunon is suno with -n, which marks it as the thing being orbited.
Why does sunon end in -n?
The -n is the accusative ending, which marks the direct object in Esperanto. In this sentence, the asteroid is doing the action, and the sun is receiving that action, so it becomes sunon. Without the -n, the grammar would be wrong in normal word order.
Why is there la before sunon, but nothing before asteroido?
Esperanto has no indefinite article. So there is no separate word for a or an. A bare noun like asteroido can mean an asteroid or sometimes asteroid(s) in general, depending on context. La is only for the.
Why do we say la sunon?