Learn Hardcore Finnish: Tämä maa on kaunis.

Tämä maa on kaunis can mean:
- This country is beautiful, or
- This land is beautiful, or
- This earth/ground is beautiful, depending on context.

Definiteness and indefiniteness (a vs. the) are understood from context, not from special words.

What does each word literally mean in Tämä maa on kaunis?

Word‑for‑word:

Tämä = this (demonstrative pronoun)
maa = land / country / earth / ground
on = is (3rd person singular of olla = to be)
kaunis = beautiful

So the structure is very close to English: This land is beautiful.

Why is it Tämä and not something like Tämä on maa kaunis or Maa tämä on kaunis?

Finnish neutral word order in simple statements is:

Subject – Verb – Complement (very similar to English).

Here:

Subject: Tämä maa (this country/land)
Verb: on (is)
Predicative adjective: kaunis (beautiful)

So Tämä maa on kaunis = This country is beautiful.

Other word orders are possible for emphasis, but for a basic, neutral sentence, this one is standard.

What is the function of on here, and does it change with the subject?

On is the 3rd person singular present form of olla (to be).

minä olen – I am
sinä olet – you (sg) are
hän / se on – he / she / it is
me olemme – we are
te olette – you (pl) are
he / ne ovat – they are

Because Tämä maa is 3rd person singular (this country), you use on. The verb doesn’t change for gender (Finnish doesn’t have grammatical gender), only for number and person.

Why doesn’t kaunis change form here? Shouldn’t it agree with maa somehow?

It does agree, but in a way that may not be obvious:

The subject maa is in the nominative singular form.
The predicative adjective kaunis also appears in the nominative singular.

In Finnish, an adjective used as a predicative (like “is beautiful”) generally:

agrees in number (singular/plural) and
agrees in case

with the noun it describes.

Here both are singular nominative, so:

maa on kaunis – the land is beautiful
maat ovat kauniit – the lands are beautiful

Notice how kaunis → kauniit in the plural, to match maat (lands).

Can maa mean both “land” and “country”? How do I know which one is meant?

Yes, maa is flexible:

land / ground / soil – e.g. Maa on märkä. (The ground is wet.)
country / nation – e.g. Suomi on pieni maa. (Finland is a small country.)
Earth (as in planet or earth vs. sky) – e.g. taivas ja maa (heaven and earth).

In Tämä maa on kaunis, context usually tells you whether the speaker means this country (common) or this land/ground/area (also possible). Without context, “this country is beautiful” is a very natural interpretation.

How is Tämä different from Tuo and Se?

All three can correspond to English this/that/it, but they’re used differently:

tämä = this (near me)
- physically or mentally close
- Tämä maa on kaunis. – This country is beautiful.
tuo = that (over there)
- more distant (visually or conceptually)
- Tuo maa tuolla on kaunis. – That country over there is beautiful.
se = that / it
- often refers to something already known or mentioned
- Se maa on kaunis. – That country (we’re talking about) is beautiful. / It is beautiful.

In practice, se is extremely common for things that are already in the conversation, while tämä really points at “this one here.”

Could I also say Tämä maa on kaunista?

No, not in this simple “X is beautiful” sense.

Maa on kaunis. – correct
Maa on kaunista. – not normally correct on its own

The partitive form kaunista is used in different structures, for example:

On kaunista. – It is beautiful (here/the weather is beautiful / it’s beautiful in general).
(impersonal expression, no explicit subject like “this land”)

But when you have a clear subject like maa in the nominative, the predicative adjective should match it: maa on kaunis.

Why isn’t there a pronoun like “it” or “she/he” before on?

In English you must say It is beautiful, but in Finnish the subject can be:

explicit: Tämä maa on kaunis. – This country is beautiful.
sometimes implicit: On kaunista. – It is beautiful / The weather is beautiful.

Finnish allows “subjectless” sentences, especially with weather, existence, or general statements. But when you’re talking specifically about this land/country, you include it explicitly as Tämä maa. You don’t also add a separate pronoun like se here.

How do you pronounce Tämä maa on kaunis? Anything tricky for an English speaker?

Rough pronunciation guide (very approximate):

Tämä – [TA-mah]
- ä like “a” in cat, but longer and clearer.
maa – [maa]
- Long a: hold it longer than English “ma”.
on – [on]
- Like “on” in “on top”; o as in British “not”.
kaunis – [KOW-nis]
- kau like “cow” in English.
- Stress is on the first syllable: KAU-nis.

Main points:

Every syllable is clearly pronounced.
Double letters (like aa in maa) are long vowels—they are truly held longer.
Stress almost always on the first syllable in Finnish words.

If I change maa to plural, how does the sentence change?

Singular:

Tämä maa on kaunis. – This country/land is beautiful.

Plural:

Nämä maat ovat kauniit. – These countries/lands are beautiful.

Changes:

Tämä → Nämä (this → these)
maa → maat (land → lands; plural nominative)
on → ovat (3rd person plural of olla)
kaunis → kauniit (adjective agrees with the plural subject)

Is there any gender in kaunis or maa, like masculine/feminine forms?

No. Finnish has no grammatical gender:

No distinction between he, she, and it in pronouns (all are hän or se in different contexts).
Nouns like maa don’t have masculine or feminine forms.
Adjectives like kaunis don’t change for gender, only for number and case.

So Tämä maa on kaunis works the same regardless of any implied gendered ideas about “country” in other languages.