Learn Hardcore Finnish: Kylä on pieni mutta kaunis. - The village is small but beautiful.

kylä on pieni could be:
- The village is small, if both speakers know which village is meant.
- A village is small, in a more generic or descriptive context.

So kylä just means village; your English brain automatically chooses a or the when translating.

What case is kylä in, and why does it look like the basic dictionary form?

Kylä is in the nominative singular case.

The nominative singular is the “basic” form you find in dictionaries.
It is used for the subject of a sentence.

Here, kylä is the subject:

Kylä (subject) on (verb) pieni (predicate adjective)…

So it stays in nominative singular: kylä, not kylän, kylässä, etc.

Why are pieni and kaunis not inflected? Shouldn’t they agree with kylä somehow?

They do agree with kylä, but agreement here just happens to look like the basic form.

With the verb olla (to be), adjectives that describe the subject usually:

agree with the subject in number and case
in the singular, nominative, the forms often look like the dictionary form

Here:

Subject: kylä – nominative singular
Predicative adjectives: pieni, kaunis – nominative singular too

So:

kylä on pieni – the village is small
kylä on kaunis – the village is beautiful

Because kylä is singular nominative, the agreeing adjectives also appear as pieni and kaunis. If you changed number/case, the adjectives would change too, e.g.:

kylät ovat pieniä ja kauniita – the villages are small and beautiful (partitive plural adjectives).

Does the verb on apply to both pieni and kaunis, even though it appears only once?

Yes. The single on covers both adjectives:

kylä on pieni mutta kaunis = the village is small but (is) beautiful.

You don’t need to repeat on before kaunis in normal Finnish:

✗ kylä on pieni mutta on kaunis – grammatically possible, but sounds clumsy and overly heavy.

Similarly, you don’t need to repeat the subject:

✗ kylä on pieni mutta se on kaunis

The standard, natural version is simply:

kylä on pieni mutta kaunis.

Why is it mutta, not vaan, for but?

Finnish has two common words translated as but: mutta and vaan.

mutta is the general word for but, used in most contrasts:
- kylä on pieni mutta kaunis – the village is small but beautiful.
vaan usually follows a negative clause and means but rather / but instead:
- se ei ole ruma, vaan kaunis – it is not ugly, but (rather) beautiful.

In your sentence, there is no negation, just a contrast, so mutta is the correct choice.

Could I say kylä on pieni ja kaunis instead? What is the difference?

Yes, you can, and it is perfectly correct.

kylä on pieni ja kaunis – the village is small and beautiful.
- Both qualities are just listed, no contrast.
kylä on pieni mutta kaunis – the village is small but beautiful.
- There is a mild contrast: smallness might be seen as a drawback, beauty as a positive feature.

So ja = and, mutta = but. The structure is the same; only the logical relationship changes.

Could the word order be different, like pieni mutta kaunis kylä on?

In theory, Finnish word order is flexible, but in practice, kylä on pieni mutta kaunis is the normal, neutral sentence.

Other orders:

pieni mutta kaunis kylä on – grammatical but sounds poetic, archaic, or like a very marked emphasis (e.g. in a poem or song).
pieni mutta kaunis kylä (without on) – this is just a noun phrase: a small but beautiful village, not a full sentence.

For an ordinary declarative sentence “The village is small but beautiful”, keep:

Subject – Verb – Predicate → Kylä on pieni mutta kaunis.

Why is there no pronoun like se (it)? Could I say se kylä on pieni mutta kaunis?

Finnish usually does not use a separate subject pronoun when the subject noun is already there and clear.

kylä on pieni mutta kaunis – subject is kylä, no need for se.

Using se together with kylä:

se kylä on pieni mutta kaunis – possible, but has a special nuance: something like that village is small but beautiful, with pointing or contrast (e.g. as opposed to some other village).

For a simple descriptive statement, omit the pronoun and just say kylä on pieni mutta kaunis.

How are y and ä pronounced in kylä?

Pronunciation:

y is a front rounded vowel, similar to:
- French u in lune
- German ü in Tür
- To approximate it: say English ee (as in see) while rounding your lips as for oo (as in too).
ä is a front, open vowel, similar to:
- The a in English cat (for many accents)
- German ä in Mädchen

So kylä is roughly like kü-lä, not like English kyla or koola. Both vowels are short.

Is on only is, or can it also mean there is / there are?

On is the 3rd person singular of olla (to be). It can be:

is (in your sentence):
- kylä on pieni – the village is small.
Part of an existential there is construction:
- Kylässä on koulu – literally in the village is a school → there is a school in the village.

So yes, on can correspond to English is or there is, depending on the structure and word order. In kylä on pieni mutta kaunis, it is just is.

Could I leave out on and say kylä, pieni mutta kaunis?

As a normal sentence, you need the verb on:

kylä on pieni mutta kaunis – correct full sentence.

Without on, kylä, pieni mutta kaunis becomes more like:

a title,
a note under a picture,
or a stylistic fragment.

Finnish, like English, normally requires a verb in a finite sentence. Dropping on can be used in headlines or poetic language, but for standard grammar, keep on.

How would I say this in the past tense?

To put the sentence into past tense, change on (present) to oli (simple past / imperfect):

kylä oli pieni mutta kaunis – the village was small but beautiful.

Everything else (cases, adjectives, mutta) stays the same. The only change is the verb form on → oli.