Questions & Answers about Minä myönnän virheen nyt.
In Finnish, the subject pronoun (like Minä = I) is usually optional, because the verb ending already shows who is doing the action.
- Myönnän already means I admit (the -n ending marks 1st person singular).
- Minä myönnän virheen nyt – neutral, maybe a bit more emphatic: I admit the mistake now (as opposed to someone else).
- Myönnän virheen nyt – completely natural and very common: I admit the mistake now.
Use Minä when:
- you want to emphasize who is doing it:
- Minä myönnän virheen, en sinä. – I admit the mistake, not you.
- or in very clear, slow speech / exercises for beginners.
Otherwise, dropping Minä is normal.
Myönnän is the present-tense 1st person singular form of the verb myöntää (to admit, grant).
The pattern is:
- infinitive: myöntää (to admit)
- 1st person singular: myönnän (I admit)
Details:
The -n ending marks I. Many verbs do this:
- puhun – I speak
- syön – I eat
- kirjoitan – I write
The stem myönnä- gets -n → myönnän. The double nn is just regular consonant gradation/spelling for this verb.
You can say myönnän minä, but:
- Myönnän minä is unusual in neutral speech; it sounds like special emphasis or poetic / stylized word order.
- Normal order is Minä myönnän or just Myönnän.
Virhe means a mistake / an error. In Minä myönnän virheen nyt, virheen is the object in the genitive case.
- virhe → virheen (genitive singular)
In Finnish, the object case often depends on whether the action is thought of as complete/whole or ongoing/partial:
Myönnän virheen.
- virheen (genitive) = a whole, specific mistake that you admit.
- I admit the mistake.
Myönnän virhettä.
- virhettä (partitive) would suggest a partial / ongoing / not-completed idea, but with myöntää, this is normally not used in this context. It would sound strange or very special.
Bare virhe (without ending) is not correct as an object here.
So virheen is the normal, correct object form for admitting a specific mistake.
The -en in virheen is the genitive singular ending.
- Nominative (basic dictionary form): virhe – mistake
- Genitive singular: virheen – of the mistake / used as a total object
The genitive singular is used:
- To show possession:
- virheen syy – the cause of the mistake
- As a total object, like here:
- myönnän virheen – I admit the mistake (as a complete thing)
So virheen is not “plural”; it’s singular, but genitive case.
Yes. Nyt (now) is quite flexible. All of these are grammatical:
- Minä myönnän virheen nyt.
- Myönnän virheen nyt.
- Nyt myönnän virheen.
- Minä nyt myönnän virheen.
The differences are mostly about emphasis and rhythm, not basic meaning.
Myönnän virheen nyt.
- Neutral: I admit the mistake now (as opposed to earlier or later).
Nyt myönnän virheen.
- Emphasis on now as a turning point:
- Now (at last / finally) I admit the mistake.
- Emphasis on now as a turning point:
Minä nyt myönnän virheen.
- Often sounds like some emotional context:
- Well, I’ll admit the mistake now (at least I will).
- Often sounds like some emotional context:
For a learner, Myönnän virheen nyt is the safest, most neutral-sounding order.
Grammatically, it is present tense:
- myönnän = I admit / I am admitting
Finnish does not have a separate future tense. Instead, present tense often covers both present and near future, depending on context:
- Myönnän virheen nyt.
- Usually: I admit the mistake now (right now).
- If you say it about something slightly later (e.g., in a meeting starting soon), it can be understood as:
- I’ll admit the mistake now (in this upcoming situation).
There is no special future form; context tells you which one is meant.
Yes, you can say:
- Minä myönnän virheen nyt. – I admit the mistake now.
- Minä myönnän virheeni nyt. – I admit my mistake now.
Difference:
- virheen = the mistake (specific, context shows whose mistake)
- virheeni = my mistake
- virhe (mistake) + -ni (my) → virheeni (my mistake)
Both are correct; choose virheeni if you want to explicitly say it is your own mistake.
Both can mean to admit, but they have slightly different typical uses:
myöntää
- to admit, to grant, to concede
- Common for acknowledging facts, responsibility, guilt.
- Myönnän virheen. – I admit the mistake.
tunnustaa
- to confess, acknowledge, recognize
- Often stronger: confess (especially crimes, sins, serious things) or acknowledge/recognize something.
- Tunnustan virheeni. – I confess my mistake. (sounds heavier / more dramatic)
- Tunnustan uskovani Jumalaan. – I confess / acknowledge that I believe in God.
In everyday speech for a plain, neutral “admit a mistake,” myöntää is more typical.
To negate a Finnish verb, you use a negative verb (en, et, ei, emme, ette, eivät) plus the connegative verb form.
For myöntää:
- Positive: Minä myönnän virheen nyt. – I admit the mistake now.
- Negative: Minä en myönnä virhettä nyt. – I do not admit the mistake now.
Notice two things:
The verb:
- myönnän → en myönnä (no personal ending on myönnä; person is carried by en)
The object:
- Positive: virheen (genitive) – total object, completed act.
- Negative: virhettä (partitive) is strongly preferred after negation.
- This is a general rule: negation usually forces the object into partitive.
So:
- Myönnän virheen. – I admit the mistake.
- En myönnä virhettä. – I do not admit the mistake.
myönnän
- Roughly: MYØN-nan
- yö is a Finnish diphthong, not like English “yo”.
- y: like French u in tu, or German ü in für. Lips rounded, tongue high and front.
- Then a short ö-like glide.
- Stress is on the first syllable: MYÖN-nän.
- Double nn = a long consonant; hold the n a bit longer than in English.
virheen
- Roughly: VEER-hen
- v like English v.
- i like in machine.
- r is trilled or tapped; try a light tap with the tongue.
- ee is a long e; hold it longer than in English bed, more like they but shorter, and without an English diphthong.
- Stress: VIR-heen (first syllable again).
Finnish always stresses the first syllable of a word, which helps with rhythm: MYÖN-nän VIR-heen NYT.