Learn Hardcore Finnish: Löysin ullakolta vanhoja leluja, jotka haluan antaa tyttärelleni. - I found old toys in the attic that I want to give to my daughter.

You can say Minä löysin ullakolta vanhoja leluja... if you want to emphasize I (for example, as opposed to someone else), but in neutral sentences the pronoun is normally dropped.

Why is it ullakolta and what does the ending -lta mean?

The base word is ullakko = “attic”. Finnish adds a case ending to express “from” instead of using a separate preposition:

ullakko = attic (basic form)
ullakolla = on/at the attic (adessive: static location)
ullakolta = from the attic (elative corresponding to -lta / -ltä “from a surface/place”)

Here -lta means “from (a surface/place)”, so ullakolta corresponds to “from the attic” in English.

Other local cases exist (like -ssa / -sta “in/from inside”), but ullakko conventionally uses the -lla / -lta pair. You wouldn’t normally say *ullakosta in standard Finnish for this meaning.

Why does vanhoja leluja use the partitive plural instead of vanhat lelut?

Vanhoja leluja is in the partitive plural:

vanha → vanhoja (partitive plural)
lelu → leluja (partitive plural)

The partitive plural is used here to express an indefinite, non‑specific quantity: “some old toys” rather than “the old toys”.

If you said Löysin ullakolta vanhat lelut, it would typically mean “I found the old toys” – a specific, known set that both speaker and listener have in mind (a “whole” set). With vanhoja leluja, you just found some old toys; you are not presenting them as one definite, complete group.

Why must vanhoja (old) and leluja (toys) both be in the same case and number?

In Finnish, adjectives normally agree with the noun they modify in:

case (nominative, partitive, genitive, etc.)
number (singular vs plural)

Since leluja is partitive plural, the adjective vanha has to match it and becomes vanhoja (also partitive plural). So:

vanhat lelut = “the old toys” (nominative plural)
vanhoja leluja = “(some) old toys” (partitive plural)

Using mismatched forms like *vanhat leluja or *vanhoja lelut would be grammatically wrong.

What exactly does tyttärelleni mean, and how is it built?

Tyttärelleni is one word that contains several pieces of information:

tytär = daughter (basic form)
stem tyttäre- (used with many endings)
-lle (allative case) = “to / onto”
-ni (possessive suffix) = “my”

So tyttärelleni literally means “to my daughter”:

tyttäre- (daughter‑stem)
-lle (to)
-ni (my)

You can also say minun tyttärelleni; there minun is an extra, separate word for “my”, but the ownership is already shown by -ni.

Why isn’t there a separate word for “my” before tyttärelleni?

Finnish often uses possessive suffixes instead of (or in addition to) separate possessive pronouns.

tyttärelleni already contains -ni, which means “my”.
So tyttärelleni by itself is enough to mean “to my daughter”.

You can add minun for emphasis or clarity: Minun tyttärelleni = “to my daughter (not someone else’s)”. In many everyday sentences, just the suffix -ni without minun is the most natural choice.

What is jotka, and why is it jotka and not joita?

Jotka is the plural form of the relative pronoun joka = “who / that / which” in the nominative plural:

nominative plural: jotka
partitive plural: joita

In ...vanhoja leluja, jotka haluan antaa tyttärelleni, jotka refers back to leluja (the toys) and functions as a total object of antaa (“to give”) in plural. For plural total objects, the form is typically nominative plural, so jotka is used.

If you changed it to joita haluan antaa tyttärelleni, it would usually imply only some of those toys are to be given, not all of them (partitive object = partial / indefinite). So:

jotka haluan antaa ≈ “which I want to give (all of them)”
joita haluan antaa ≈ “some of which I want to give”

Why is there a comma before jotka haluan antaa tyttärelleni?

In Finnish, a comma is normally placed before a relative clause introduced by joka (and its forms: joka, jota, jotka, joista, etc.), regardless of whether English would use a comma or not.

So the structure is:

Löysin ullakolta vanhoja leluja,
jotka haluan antaa tyttärelleni.

The comma simply marks the beginning of the subordinate (relative) clause. Unlike English, Finnish punctuation rules here are quite fixed: you would not normally omit that comma.

Why is the second verb antaa in its basic form after haluan?

Finnish often uses a verb + infinitive structure, similar to English “want to do”, “try to do”, etc.

haluan = “I want”
antaa = basic (1st) infinitive of “to give”

So haluan antaa literally corresponds to “I want to give”.

After haluta (“to want”), you use the first infinitive (antaa, tehdä, nähdä, etc.), not forms like *antamaan in this meaning. Antamaan (third infinitive illative) is used in different constructions, for example mennä antamaan (“go to give”).

Can the word order be changed, for example to Ullakolta löysin vanhoja leluja, jotka haluan antaa tyttärelleni?

Yes. Finnish word order is relatively flexible because case endings show who does what to whom. Different orders mainly affect emphasis:

Löysin ullakolta vanhoja leluja...
Neutral: “I found some old toys in the attic.”
Ullakolta löysin vanhoja leluja...
Emphasizes ullakolta (“It was from the attic that I found some old toys”).
Vanhoja leluja löysin ullakolta...
Emphasizes the fact that what you found were old toys (perhaps in contrast to something else).

All these are grammatically correct; the choice depends on what you want to highlight.

What is the difference between löysin and löytyi in similar sentences?

löysin is active, transitive: “I found (something).”
It clearly states who did the finding.
löytyi is intransitive (passive‑like): “(something) was found / turned up.”
The finder is not mentioned.

Compare:

Löysin ullakolta vanhoja leluja.
“I found some old toys in the attic.”
Ullakolta löytyi vanhoja leluja.
“Some old toys were found / There turned up some old toys in the attic.”
(We don’t know or don’t care who found them.)

In your original sentence, löysin is appropriate because the speaker is explicitly the one who found the toys.

Could I say Löysin ullakolta vanhoja leluja ja haluan antaa ne tyttärelleni instead? What changes?

Yes, that is a natural sentence, but the structure changes slightly:

Original: Löysin ullakolta vanhoja leluja, jotka haluan antaa tyttärelleni.
One main clause + a relative clause specifying “the toys that I want to give”.
Alternative: Löysin ullakolta vanhoja leluja ja haluan antaa ne tyttärelleni.
Two main clauses joined by ja (“and”), and ne (“them”) refers back to vanhoja leluja.

Meaning-wise they are very close. The version with jotka ties the toys more tightly to the “want to give” information, like “the toys (the ones I found) which I want to give...”, while the ja + ne version sounds a bit more like two sequential statements: “I found some old toys, and I want to give them to my daughter.”

How would I change the sentence if I only wanted to give some of the toys I found to my daughter?

You can show that only part of the found toys will be given by using the partitive in the relative pronoun:

Löysin ullakolta vanhoja leluja, joista haluan antaa tyttärelleni vain osan.
“I found some old toys in the attic, of which I want to give my daughter only some.”

Or more minimally:

Löysin ullakolta vanhoja leluja, joista haluan antaa tyttärelleni muutaman.
“I found some old toys in the attic, and I want to give my daughter a few of them.”

If you want to contrast directly with the original structure, you can also say:

Löysin ullakolta vanhoja leluja, joista haluan antaa tyttärelleni joitakin.

Here joista (“of which”) or joita (“some of which”, as a partitive relative object) makes it clear that you are not giving all of the toys you found.