Silta on pitkä mutta turvallinen.

to be

Breakdown of Silta on pitkä mutta turvallinen.

• mutta: but
• pitkä: long
• silta: the bridge

Questions & Answers about Silta on pitkä mutta turvallinen.

Why isn’t there an article like “the” or “a” before silta?

Finnish doesn’t use articles. A noun alone covers both “a” and “the.” Context tells you whether it’s definite or indefinite. So silta can mean “a bridge” or “the bridge.”

What does on mean in silta on pitkä?

On is the 3rd person singular of olla (to be).
• silta on = the bridge is
You need it to link the subject to its description.

Why are pitkä and turvallinen uninflected here?

They’re used predicatively (after on), so they stay in the basic nominative singular form. Attributive adjectives (before a noun) must agree in case, but predicative ones do not.
• attributive: pitkä silta (long bridge)
• predicative: silta on pitkä (the bridge is long)

Why does pitkä come after the verb instead of before silta, unlike English word order?

In Finnish, when you describe something with olla, the adjective follows the verb as a predicate. If you want the adjective before the noun (like English), it’s attributive, not predicative:
• predicative: silta on pitkä
• attributive: pitkä silta

What kind of word is , and could I use something else?