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Questions & Answers about Lintu lentää taivaalla.
Why isn’t there an article like the or a before lintu?
Finnish has no articles; lintu can mean either a bird or the bird based on context.
What grammatical case is lintu in?
It’s in the nominative singular, the form Finnish uses for subjects.
Why don’t we need a pronoun like se (it) before the verb?
Finnish verbs are inflected for person and number. lentää is 3rd person singular, so the subject pronoun is usually dropped. You can add Se for emphasis (e.g. Se lentää taivaalla), but it isn’t required.
What form of the verb is lentää, and how is it constructed?
lentää is the 3rd person singular present tense of the verb lentää (to fly). In Finnish the present stem is lentä- and the 3rd person singular has no extra suffix, so lentä- becomes lentää, meaning (he/she/it) flies.
What case is taivaalla, and what does it express?
taivaalla is the adessive case (marked -lla/llä). It expresses location “on” or “at” something—in this sentence, idiomatically in the sky.
Why do we use the adessive here instead of the inessive -ssa/-ssä?
Open or external spaces (sky, water surfaces, fields) take the adessive in Finnish. The inessive form taivaassa would literally mean “inside the sky” and sounds odd; taivaalla is the normal way to say in the sky.
What’s the difference between taivaalla and taivaalle?
taivaalla (adessive -lla) indicates static location: on/in the sky. taivaalle (allative -lle) indicates motion toward: onto/to the sky. E.g. Lintu lentää taivaalle = “The bird flies up into the sky.”
Why is taivaalla spelled with aa?
The noun stem taiva- ends in a; adding the adessive ending -lla gives taiva + lla → taivaalla. Finnish writes both a vowels separately, resulting in the long aa.
Can the word order be changed in this sentence?
Yes. The neutral order is Subject–Verb–Adverbial (Lintu lentää taivaalla). You can front the location for emphasis: Taivaalla lentää lintu, or use Lentää lintu taivaalla for a more poetic or dramatic tone.