Keitin vehnää suuressa kattilassa eilen iltapäivällä.

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Breakdown of Keitin vehnää suuressa kattilassa eilen iltapäivällä.

• eilen: yesterday
• suuri: large
• keittää: to cook
• vehnä: the wheat
• kattila: the pot
• iltapäivällä: in the afternoon

Questions & Answers about Keitin vehnää suuressa kattilassa eilen iltapäivällä.

What does the verb keitin mean, and how does its form indicate the subject?

Keitin is the first-person singular past tense form of the verb keittää, which means to boil (or to cook by boiling). The ending -in shows that the subject is I, so there is no need to explicitly include the pronoun minä.

Why is the word vehnää in the partitive case, and what does that signify?

Vehnää is the partitive form of vehnä (meaning wheat). In Finnish, the partitive case is often used with objects when the action is incomplete, ongoing, or when dealing with a substance rather than a countable quantity. In this cooking context, it implies that an indefinite amount of wheat is being boiled.

How does the adjective suuressa agree with the noun it describes, and what case is it in?

Suuressa is the inflected form of the adjective suuri (meaning large) and it agrees with kattilassa. It carries the same inessive case ending -ssa, indicating the location. This agreement shows that in Finnish, adjectives must match the case of the noun they modify.

What is the grammatical role of kattilassa in the sentence, and what case is it?

Kattilassa is in the inessive case, which ends in -ssa. This case is used to indicate location, so kattilassa means in a pot. It specifies where the boiling took place.

Can you explain the time expressions eilen and iltapäivällä in this sentence?

Certainly! Eilen means yesterday, and iltapäivällä is the adessive case form of iltapäivä (meaning afternoon), here translating to in the afternoon. Together, they specify the exact time the action occurred.

What can be inferred about Finnish sentence structure from this example?

This sentence demonstrates Finnish’s flexible word order. While the basic idea is expressed clearly through case markings (for example, indicating location and object), the chronological time expressions are placed at the end. The cases on adjectives and nouns ensure that even with a less rigid word order, the meaning remains unambiguous.