Tapasin erään lääkärin eilen.

I met a certain doctor yesterday.

Breakdown of Tapasin erään lääkärin eilen.

• eilen: yesterday
• tavata: to meet
• lääkäri: the doctor
• eräs: a certain; one particular

Questions & Answers about Tapasin erään lääkärin eilen.

What does tapasin mean grammatically?

Tapasin is the 1st person singular past tense form of the verb tavata, which means to meet.

So:

• tavata = to meet
• tapaan = I meet / I am meeting
• tapasin = I met

The ending -in is a very common marker of the past tense in Finnish for I forms.

Why is lääkärin used instead of the basic form lääkäri?

Because lääkärin is the form needed for the object in this sentence.

In Tapasin erään lääkärin eilen, the doctor is the thing/person that was met, so it is the object of the verb. In an affirmative sentence like this, when the action is seen as a complete whole, Finnish usually uses the total object.

For singular nouns, the total object often looks like the genitive form:

• lääkäri = doctor
• lääkärin = doctor (object form here)

So lääkärin does not mean possession here. It is functioning as the object form required by the sentence.

Why is erään also in the -n form?

Because erään goes with lääkärin, and in Finnish modifiers agree with the noun they modify.

Here:

• eräs = a certain / one
• erään = the matching form used with lääkärin

So:

• erään lääkärin

Both words are in the same case/form because they belong together as one noun phrase.