Citizendia

Estonian
eesti keel
Spoken in:Estonia 
Region:Northern Europe
Total speakers:1. Estonia, officially the Republic of Estonia ( Eesti or Eesti Vabariik) is a Country in Northern Europe in the Baltic region Northern Europe is a term for the northern part of Europe. The United Nations defines Northern Europe as (Finland 1 million
Language family:Uralic
 Finno-Ugric
  Finno-Lappic
   Baltic-Finnic
    Estonian 
Official status
Official language in:Flag of Estonia Estonia
Flag of Europe European Union
Regulated by:Institute of the Estonian Language / Eesti Keele Instituut (semi-official)
Language codes
ISO 639-1:et
ISO 639-2:est
ISO 639-3:est
Note: This page may contain IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. List of language familiesA language family is a group of Languages related by descent from a common ancestor called the Proto-language of that family The Uralic languages (jʊˈrælɨk constitute a language family of 39 Languages spoken by approximately 20 million people Finno-Ugric (ˌfɪnoʊˈjuːgɹɪk is a grouping of languages in the Uralic language family comprising Finnish, Estonian, Hungarian and Finno-Ugric (ˌfɪnoʊˈjuːgɹɪk is a grouping of languages in the Uralic language family comprising Finnish, Estonian, Hungarian and The Baltic-Finnic languages, spoken around the Baltic Sea by about 7 million people are a branch of Finnic languages belonging to the Finno-Ugric group Estonia, officially the Republic of Estonia ( Eesti or Eesti Vabariik) is a Country in Northern Europe in the Baltic region The European Union ( EU) is a political and economic union of twenty-seven member states, located primarily in This is a list of bodies that regulate Standard languages Natural languages Auxiliary languages Interlingua The auxiliary language ISO 639-1 is the first part of the ISO 639 international-standard language-code family ISO 639-2 is the second part of the ISO 639 standard, which lists codes for the representation of the names of languages ISO 639 -3 (ISO 639-32007 is an international standard for Language codes The standard describes three‐letter codes for identifying languages In Computing, Unicode is an Industry standard allowing Computers to consistently represent and manipulate text expressed in most of the world's

Estonian (eesti keel (help·info); pronounced [ˈeːsti ˈkeːl]) is the official language of Estonia, spoken by about 1. Estonia, officially the Republic of Estonia ( Eesti or Eesti Vabariik) is a Country in Northern Europe in the Baltic region 1 million people in Estonia and tens of thousands in various émigré communities. Émigré is a French term that literally refers to a person who has "migrated out" but often carries a connotation of politico-social self- Exile. It is a Finno-Ugric language and is closely related to Finnish. Finno-Ugric (ˌfɪnoʊˈjuːgɹɪk is a grouping of languages in the Uralic language family comprising Finnish, Estonian, Hungarian and Finnish ( or suomen kieli) is the language spoken by the majority of the population in Finland (92% As of 2006) and by ethnic Finns outside

One distinctive feature that has caused a great amount of interest in linguists is that Estonian has what is traditionally seen as three degrees of phoneme length: short, long, and "overlong", such that /toto/, /toˑto/ and /toːto/ are distinct. Linguistics is the scientific study of Language, encompassing a number of sub-fields The phoneME project is Sun Microsystems reference implementation of Java virtual machine and associated libraries of Java ME with source licensed under the GNU In actuality, the distinction isn't purely in the phoneme length, and the underlying phonological mechanism is still disputed.

Another feature that sets Estonian apart from most languages is the vowel õ ([ɤ]), a close-mid near-back unrounded vowel, which is farther back than the schwa ([ə]), but unrounded unlike [o]. Estonian In Estonian, Õ is the 27th letter of the alphabet (between W and Ä) representing the Close-mid back unrounded vowel The close-mid back unrounded vowel is a type of Vowel sound used in some spoken Languages Its symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet is ɤ In Linguistics, specifically Phonetics and Phonology, schwa can mean the following An unstressed and toneless neutral

Contents

Revived language

Further information: List of revived languages

Cannot the tongue of this land
In the fire of incantation
Rising up to the heavens
Seek for eternity?

Kristjan Jaak Peterson

Those lines have been interpreted as a claim to reestablish the birthright of the Estonian language. Revived languages are those which having experienced near or complete extinction as either a spoken or written language were intentionally revived and have eventually Kristjan Jaak Peterson (1801-22) the first student at the then German-language University of Tartu to acknowledge his Estonian origin, is commonly regarded as a herald of Estonian national literature and considered the founder of modern Estonian poetry. Kristjan Jaak Peterson ( Riga -, Riga was an Estonian poet commonly regarded as a herald of Estonian national literature and the founder of modern Estonian The University of Tartu (Tartu Ülikool Тартуский университет Universität Dorpat is a classical University in the city of Tartu, Estonia Estonian literature refers to literature written in the Estonian language (c His birthday on March 14 is celebrated in Estonia as the Mother Tongue Day. Events 1489 - The Queen of Cyprus, Catherine Cornaro, sells her kingdom to Venice. Estonia, officially the Republic of Estonia ( Eesti or Eesti Vabariik) is a Country in Northern Europe in the Baltic region A first language (also mother tongue, native language, arterial language, or L1) is the language a human being learns from birth [1]

The domination of Estonia after the Northern Crusades, from the 13th century to 1918 by Denmark, Germany, Sweden, and Russia resulted in few early written literary works in the Estonian language. Estonia, officially the Republic of Estonia ( Eesti or Eesti Vabariik) is a Country in Northern Europe in the Baltic region The Northern Crusades or Baltic Crusades were Crusades undertaken by the Catholic kings of Denmark and Sweden, the German Livonian The Kingdom of Denmark ( ˈd̥ænmɑɡ̊ (archaic ˈd̥anmɑːɡ̊ commonly known as Denmark, is a country in the Scandinavian region of northern Europe Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany ( ˈbʊndəsʁepuˌbliːk ˈdɔʏtʃlant is a Country in Central Europe. "Sverige" redirects here For other uses see Sweden (disambiguation and Sverige (disambiguation. Russia (Россия Rossiya) or the Russian Federation ( Rossiyskaya Federatsiya) is a transcontinental Country extending Writings in Estonian became significant only in the 19th century with the spread of the ideas of the Age of Enlightenment, during the Estophile Enlightenment Period (1750-1840). The Age of Enlightenment or The Enlightenment is a term used to describe a phase in Western philosophy and cultural life centered upon the eighteenth century Estophilia (from Greek: φίλος, 'dear loving') refers to the ideas and activities of people not of Estonian descent sympathetic to or interested in Although Baltic Germans at large regarded the future of Estonians as being a fusion with the Baltic Germans, the Estophile educated class admired the ancient culture of the Estonians and their era of freedom before the conquests by Danes and Germans in the 13 century. The Baltic Germans (Deutschbalten or Baltendeutsche) were mostly ethnically German inhabitants of the eastern shore of the Baltic Sea, which today [2]

After the Estonian War of Independence, the Estonian language became the state language of the newly independent country. The Estonian War of Independence (Vabadussõda literally "freedom war" which occurred in 1918-1920 took place during the Russian Civil War, was the An official language is a Language that is given a special legal status in a particular Country, State, or other territory When the Soviet Union occupied Estonia in 1940, the status of the Estonian language changed overnight. [3] In the second half of the 1970s, the pressure of Russification and bilingualism intensified. Russification (in Russian: русификация rusifikátsiya)is an adoption of the Russian language or some other Russian attribute (whether voluntarily The Russian language was termed as ‘the language of friendship of nations’, and was taught to Estonian children as early as in kindergarten. At the same time teaching Estonian to non-Estonians was considered unnecessary. [4] During the Perestroika era The Law on the Status of the Estonian Language was adopted in January 1989. (Перестройка) is the Russian term (now used in English for the economic reforms introduced in June 1987 by the Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev The collapse of the Soviet Union led to the restoration of Republic of Estonia's independence. The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR was a constitutionally Socialist state that existed in Eurasia from 1922 to 1991 Estonia, officially the Republic of Estonia ( Eesti or Eesti Vabariik) is a Country in Northern Europe in the Baltic region Estonian went back to being the only state language in Estonia. An official language is a Language that is given a special legal status in a particular Country, State, or other territory

Estonian literature

Main article: Estonian literature

The oldest records of written Estonian date from the 13th century. Estonian literature refers to literature written in the Estonian language (c Originates Livoniae in Chronicle of Henry of Livonia contains Estonian place names, words and fragments of sentences. The Chronicle of Henry of Livonia ( Latin: Heinrici Cronicon Lyvoniae) is a historic document describing the history of Livonia and surrounding areas from The earliest extant samples of connected Estonian are the so-called Kullamaa prayers dating from 1524 and 1528. [5]In 1525 the first book published in the Estonian language was printed. The book was a Lutheran manuscript, which never reached the reader and was destroyed immediately after publication. The first extant Estonian book is a bilingual German-Estonian translation of the Lutheran catechism by S. Wanradt and J. Koell dating to 1535, during the Protestant Reformation period. The Protestant Reformation was a reform movement in Europe that began in 1517 though its roots lie further back in time For the use of priests an Estonian grammar was printed in German in 1637. [6] The New Testament was translated into southern Estonian in 1686 (northern Estonian, 1715). The Võro language ( võro kiil) is a language belonging to the Baltic-Finnic branch of the Finno-Ugric languages. The two dialects were united based on northern Estonian by Anton Thor Helle. Writings in Estonian became more significant in the 19th century during the Estophile Enlightenment Period (1750-1840). Estophilia (from Greek: φίλος, 'dear loving') refers to the ideas and activities of people not of Estonian descent sympathetic to or interested in

The birth of native Estonian literature was in 1810 to 1820 when the patriotic and philosophical poems by Kristjan Jaak Peterson were published. Kristjan Jaak Peterson ( Riga -, Riga was an Estonian poet commonly regarded as a herald of Estonian national literature and the founder of modern Estonian From 1525 to 1917 14 503 titles were published in Estonia, as opposed to the 23 868 titles which were published 1918 and 1940.

In modern times Jaan Kross[7] and Jaan Kaplinski[8] remain as two of Estonia's best known and most translated writers. Jaan Kross ( February 19, 1920 – December 27, 2007) was the most eminent contemporary Estonian Writer. Jaan Kaplinski (born January 22, 1941, Tartu) is an Estonian Poet, Philosopher, and culture critic Estonia, officially the Republic of Estonia ( Eesti or Eesti Vabariik) is a Country in Northern Europe in the Baltic region

Classification

Estonian belongs to the Finnic branch of the Finno-Ugric languages. Finno-Ugric (ˌfɪnoʊˈjuːgɹɪk is a grouping of languages in the Uralic language family comprising Finnish, Estonian, Hungarian and Estonian is thus closely related to Finnish, spoken on the other side of the Gulf of Finland, and is one of the few languages of Europe that is not Indo-European. Finnish ( or suomen kieli) is the language spoken by the majority of the population in Finland (92% As of 2006) and by ethnic Finns outside The Gulf of Finland ( Finnish: Suomenlahti, Russian: Финский залив, Finskiy zaliv, Swedish: Finska viken Despite some overlaps in the vocabulary due to borrowings, in terms of its origin, Estonian is not related to its nearest neighbours, Swedish, Latvian and Russian, which are all Indo-European languages. Swedish ( is a North Germanic language spoken by more than nine million people predominantly in Sweden and parts of Finland, especially along the Latvian language (latviešu valoda is the official state language of Latvia. Russian ( transliteration:,) is the most geographically widespread language of Eurasia, the most widely spoken of the Slavic languages

Estonian is distantly related to Hungarian (there is no mutual intelligibility between the two). Hungarian ( magyar nyelv) is a Uralic language (more specifically a Ugric language) unrelated to most other languages in Europe. It has been influenced by German (initially Middle Low German, later also standard German), Russian, Swedish and Latvian, though it is not related to them genetically. The German language (de ''Deutsch'') is a West Germanic language and one of the world's major languages. Middle Low German ( ISO 639 -3 code gml) is a Language that is the descendant of Old Saxon and is the ancestor of modern Low German. Standard German ( German: Hochdeutsch) is the standard varieties of the German language used as a Written language, in formal contexts Russian ( transliteration:,) is the most geographically widespread language of Eurasia, the most widely spoken of the Slavic languages Swedish ( is a North Germanic language spoken by more than nine million people predominantly in Sweden and parts of Finland, especially along the Latvian language (latviešu valoda is the official state language of Latvia. List of language familiesA language family is a group of Languages related by descent from a common ancestor called the Proto-language of that family

Like Finnish and Hungarian, Estonian is an agglutinative language, but unlike them, it has lost the vowel harmony of Proto-Finno-Ugric, although in older texts the vowel harmony is still to be recognized. An agglutinative language is a Language that uses Agglutination extensively most Words are formed by joining Morphemes together Vowel harmony is a type of long-distance ( see below) assimilatory phonological process involving Vowels in some languages Proto-Finno-Ugric is the reconstructed Protolanguage for the Finno-Ugric languages, that is the ancestor of the Finnic languages, such as Furthermore, the apocope of word-final sounds is extensive and has caused a shift from a purely agglutinative to an inflected language. The basic word order is Subject Verb Object. In Linguistic typology, subject-verb-object ( SVO) is a sentence structure where the subject comes first the Verb second and the object

Dialects

The Estonian dialects are divided into two groups - the northern and southern dialects, usually associated with the cities of Tallinn in the north and Tartu in the south, in addition to a distinct kirderanniku dialect, that of the northeastern coast of Estonia. Tallinn (historically known by the German, Swedish and Danish name Reval or the Polish name Rewal, among other names Tartu is the second largest City of Estonia. In contrast to Estonia's political and financial capital Tallinn, Tartu is often considered the intellectual

The northern group consists of the kesk or middle dialect that is also the basis for the standard language, the lääne or western dialect, roughly corresponding to Läänemaa and Pärnumaa, the saarte (islands') dialect of Saaremaa and Hiiumaa and the ida or eastern dialect on the northwestern shore of Lake Peipsi. Läänemaa ( Latin: Rotalia, Maritima, Low German: Wiek) was an independent country on the east coast of Baltic Pärnu County (Pärnu maakond or Pärnumaa, is one of 15 counties of Estonia. Saaremaa is the largest Island belonging to Estonia, measuring 2673 km². Hiiumaa is the second largest Island (989 km² belonging to Estonia. A shore or shoreline is the fringe of land at the edge of a large body of water such as an Ocean, Sea, or Lake. Lake Peipus (Peipsi-Pihkva järv Чудско-Псковское озеро (Chud Lake Peipussee is a large fresh water lake on the border between Estonia and Russia

The southern group consists of the Tartu, Mulgi, Võro and Seto dialects. These are sometimes considered either variants of a South Estonian language, or separate languages altogether. South Estonian language refers to a language or dialect group spoken in Southern Estonia ( Võru, Põlva, Valga, Tartu, Also, Seto is not usually considered a dialect of Estonian, but rather a variant of Võro. Seto or Setu language ( seto kiil´) is a dialect of the Finnic South Estonian or Võro language (or a separate language which is The Võro language ( võro kiil) is a language belonging to the Baltic-Finnic branch of the Finno-Ugric languages.

Writing system

Alphabet

Main article: Estonian alphabet

Like Finnish, Estonian employs the Latin alphabet, in addition to which the Estonian alphabet contains letters š, ž, ä, ö, ü, and õ. The Estonian alphabet is used for writing the Estonian language and is based on the Latin alphabet, with German influence The Estonian alphabet is used for writing the Estonian language and is based on the Latin alphabet, with German influence The letters c, q, w, x and y are limited to proper names of foreign origin, and f, z, š, and ž appear in loanwords and foreign names only. "A proper name a word that answers the purpose of showing what thing it is that we are talking about" writes John Stuart Mill in A System of Logic Ö, and ü are pronounced similarly to their equivalents in German. Unlike in standard German, Ä is pronounced [æ], as in English mat. The vowels Ä, Ö and Ü are, unlike in German, clearly separate phonemes and inherent in Estonian, although the letter shapes come from German. The letter õ denotes /ɤ/, unrounded /o/, or a close-mid back unrounded vowel. The close-mid back unrounded vowel is a type of Vowel sound used in some spoken Languages Its symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet is ɤ (It has a different sound from the same letter in Portuguese. Portuguese ( or língua portuguesa) is a Romance language that originated in what is now Galicia (Spain and northern Portugal. It is similar to the Turkish ı, Kazakh ұ and the Vietnamese ơ. Turkish ( tr Türkçe IPA) is a language spoken by over 63 million people worldwide making it the most commonly spoken of the Turkic languages. Kazakh (also Qazaq and variants natively kk Qazaq tili, kk Қазақ тілі; pronounced tˈlə is a Turkic language closely related to Vietnamese ( tiếng Việt, or less commonly Việt ngữ) formerly known under French colonization as Annamese ( see Annam) Ơ is one of the 12 Vietnamese language vowels It is pronounced like an Unrounded O. )

Orthography

Estonian orthography is essentially phonemic with each phoneme of the language represented by exactly one grapheme. The phoneME project is Sun Microsystems reference implementation of Java virtual machine and associated libraries of Java ME with source licensed under the GNU In Typography, a grapheme is the fundamental unit in written language. Exceptions to this derive from historical agreements: for example the initial letter 'h' in words, preservation of the morpheme in declension of the word (writing b, g, d in places where p, k, t is pronounced) and in the use of 'i' and 'j'. In Linguistics, declension (or declination) is the occurrence of Inflection in Nouns Pronouns and Adjectives indicating Where it is very impractical or impossible to type š and ž, they are substituted with sh and zh in some written texts, although this is considered incorrect. Otherwise, the h in sh represents a voiceless glottal fricative, as in pasha (pas-'ha); this also applies to some foreign names. The voiceless glottal transition, commonly called a " fricative " is a type of sound used in some spoken Languages which often behaves like a

Modern Estonian orthography is based on the Newer Orthography created by Eduard Ahrens in the second half of the 19th century based on Finnish Orthography. The Older Orthography it replaced was created in the 17th century by Bengt Gottfried Forselius and Johann Hornung based on standard German orthography. Bengt Gottfried Forselius ( ca 1660 Harju-Madise, Harju County, Estonia (then part of Sweden) – November 16, 1688 The German language (de ''Deutsch'') is a West Germanic language and one of the world's major languages. Earlier writing in Estonian had by and large used an ad hoc orthography based on Latin and Middle Low German orthography. Latin ( lingua Latīna, laˈtiːna is an Italic language, historically spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. Middle Low German ( ISO 639 -3 code gml) is a Language that is the descendant of Old Saxon and is the ancestor of modern Low German. Some influences of the standard German orthography — for example, writing 'W'/'w' instead of 'V'/'v' persisted well into the 1930s.

It should be noted that Estonian words and names quoted in international publications from Soviet sources are often incorrect back-transliterations from the Russian transliteration. Examples are the use of "ya" for "ä" (e. g. Pyarnu instead of the correct Pärnu) and "y" instead of "õ" (e. Pärnu (Pernau Пярну formerly Пернов Parnawa is a City in southwestern Estonia on the coast of Pärnu Bay an inlet of the Gulf of Riga g. , Pylva instead of the correct Põlva). Põlva (Põlva is the capital of Põlva County (Põlvamaa one of 15 counties of Estonia. Even in the "Encyclopaedia Britannica" one can find "ostrov Khiuma", where "ostrov" means "island" in Russian and "Khiuma" is back-transliteration from Russian instead of correct "Hiiumaa" (Hiiumaa>Хийума(а)>Khiuma). The Encyclopædia Britannica is a general English-language encyclopaedia published by Encyclopædia Britannica Inc Hiiumaa is the second largest Island (989 km² belonging to Estonia.

Phonology

Vowels

FrontBack
UnroundedRoundedUnroundedRounded
Closeiyu
Mid1eøɤo
Openæɑ
  1. The mid vowels are not close-mid or open-mid; the usual IPA notation uses these symbols.

There are nine phonemic monophthongs, with three phonetic lengths. Of these, simple and long are segmentally phonemic, and the third length level is suprasegmentally phonemic and aided by a distinctive tonal contour. The script distinguishes only short and long, marked by vowel doubling, e. g. öö "night". There are 19 segmental diphthongs,[9] and polysyllablic vowel clusters are also found. There are very few instances of vowel allophony: 'ä' may have pronunciations [æ] and [ɛ], and the phoneme /yː/ is pronounced as the diphthong [yi].

Consonants

BilabialLabiodentalAlveolarPostalveolarPalatalVelarGlottal
Plosivep pʲt tʲk kʲ
Nasalmn nʲ(ŋ)1
Fricative(f) vs sʲ(ʃ)h
Approximantl lʲj
Trillr

Notes:

  1. [ŋ] only appears as an allophone of [n] before [k]. In Phonetics, a bilabial consonant is a Consonant articulated with both Lips The bilabial consonants identified by the International Phonetic Alphabet In Phonetics, labiodentals are Consonants articulated with the lower Lip and the upper Teeth. Alveolar consonants are articulated with the tongue against or close to the superior Alveolar ridge, which is called that because it contains the alveoli (the sockets Postalveolar consonants are Consonants articulated with the tongue near or touching the back of the Alveolar ridge, placing them a bit further back in the Palatal consonants are Consonants articulated with the body of the tongue raised against the Hard palate (the middle part of the roof of the mouth Glottal consonants are Consonants articulated with the Glottis. A stop, plosive, or occlusive is a Consonant sound produced by stopping the airflow in the Vocal tract. A nasal consonant (also called nasal stop or nasal continuant) is produced with a lowered velum in the mouth allowing air to escape freely through the Fricatives are Consonants produced by forcing air through a narrow channel made by placing two articulators close together Approximants are speech sounds ( Phonemes) that could be regarded as intermediate between Vowels and typical Consonants In the articulation of approximants In Phonetics, a trill is a Consonantal sound produced by vibrations between the articulator and the Place of articulation. In Phonetics, an allophone is one of several similar speech sounds ( Phones that belong to the same Phoneme. [9]
  2. [f] and [ʃ] are considered foreign sounds and they only appear in loanwords.

There is one series of stops, unvoiced unaspirated, with three phonemic lengths, written b d g, p t k and pp tt kk. The rest of the consonants also have distinctive length, but only short and long are distinguished in writing. As with vowels, two segmental length levels are phonemic, and the third level is suprasegmentally phonemic. For example, for 'n', short 'n' in lina "sheet", half-long 'n' in linna "town's", over-long 'n' in linna "to the town". The latter addition of length is traceable to a grammatical marker *-han that has elided.

The fricatives are s h, added with f š ž z for loans. The other consonants are j l m n r v, plus the allophonic velar nasal in nk and ng. The velar nasal is a type of Consonantal sound used in some spoken Languages The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents Consonants may be palatalized; but this is not written in the orthography, as palatalization generally occurs before front vowels (also in the final consonant in the nominative case of nouns if such vowel follows in the genetive). About 0. 15% of the vocabulary features fully phonemic palatalization, where palatalization occurs without the front vowel. The process is similar to that found in Eastern Finnish dialects, where word-final 'i' is elided, leaving the palatalization on the consonant. Thus, palatalization does not necessarily need a front vowel, and palatalized vs. plain continuants can be articulated.

Proto-Finnic, the ancestor of the Estonian language, lost palatalization, but Estonian is one of those languages which reacquired it from Slavic. Yet, it underwent further modification, which makes Estonian palatalization different from Russian palatalization. In Russian, palatalization causes some affrication and necessarily features a palatal approximant/fricative offglide, which is not the case in Estonian, where the consonant is otherwise unaffected.

Gradation

In Estonian, sounds alternate between various grades of sound length and sound quality in different grammatical forms of a word; see also vowel gradation, consonant gradation, lenition. In Linguistics, an alternation is the phenomenon of a Phoneme or Morpheme exhibiting variation in its phonological realization Consonant gradation is a type of Consonant mutation, in which consonants alternate between various "grades" Lenition is a kind of Consonant mutation that appears in many Languages Along with assimilation, it is one of the primary sources of historical change

Quantitative changes (strong grade : weak grade)

Qualitative changes (strong grade : weak grade)

Partition of grades in declension

Partition of grades in conjugation

Stress

The stress in Estonian is usually on the first syllable. There are some exceptions with the stress on the second syllable: aitäh "thanks", sõbranna "female friend". In loanwords, the original stress can be borrowed as well: ideaal "ideal", professor "professor". The stress is weak, and as length levels already control an aspect of "articulation intensity", most words appear evenly stressed.

Grammar

Main article: Estonian grammar

Typologically, Estonian represents a transitional form from an agglutinating language to a fusional language. Estonian grammar is a Grammar of the Estonian language. Nouns Inflectional endings as listed below are added to the stem of a noun which is formed An agglutinative language is a Language that uses Agglutination extensively most Words are formed by joining Morphemes together For fusion in Word formation, see Compound (linguistics. A fusional language (also called inflecting language) is a Over the course of Estonian history, German has exercised a strong influence on Estonian, both in vocabulary and syntax. The German language (de ''Deutsch'') is a West Germanic language and one of the world's major languages.

In Estonian nouns and pronouns do not have grammatical gender, but nouns and adjectives decline in fourteen cases: nominative, genitive, partitive, illative, inessive, elative, allative, adessive, ablative, translative, terminative, essive, abessive, and comitative, with the case and number of the adjective(s) always agreeing with that of the noun (except in the terminative, essive, abessive and comitative, where there is agreement only for the number, the adjective being in the genitive form). In Linguistics, grammatical genders, sometimes also called Noun classes are classes of nouns reflected in the behavior of associated words every noun must belong The nominative case is a Grammatical case for a Noun, which generally marks the subject of a Verb, as opposed to its object or other In Grammar, the genitive case or possessive case (also called the second case) is the case that marks a Noun as modifying another Note partitive case has to be distinguished from partitive meaning which refers to the selection of a part or quantity out of a group or amount see Partitive. Illative case in the Finno-Ugric languages Illative (from Latin illatus "brought in" is in the Finnish language, Estonian language Inessive case (from Latin inesse "to be in or at" is a locative Grammatical case. See Elative for disambiguation Elative (from Latin efferre "to bring or carry out" is a locative case with the basic Allative case ( abbreviated ALL, from Latin allāt-, afferre "to bring to" is a type of the locative In Finno-Ugric languages, such as Finnish, Estonian and Hungarian, the adessive case (from Latin adesse "to be present" In Linguistics, ablative case ( abbreviated ABL) is a name given to cases in various languages whose common characteristic This Declension (case indicates a change in state of a noun with the general sense of "becoming X " or "change to X " In morphology, the terminative case is a case to tell where something ends (i The essive or similaris case carries the meaning of a temporary state of being often equivalent to the English "as a In Linguistics, abessive (abbreviated ABESS, from Latin abesse "to be distant" caritive and privative (abbreviated The comitative case, also known as the associative case, is a Grammatical case that denotes companionship and is used where English would use "in company with" Thus the illative for "a yellow house" (kollane maja) — "into a yellow house" is (kollasesse majja).

The direct object of the verb appears either in the accusative (for total objects) or in the partitive (for partial objects). The accusative case ( abbreviated ACC) of a Noun is the Grammatical case used to mark the Direct object of a Transitive The accusative coincides with the genitive in the singular and with nominative in the plural. Accusative vs. partitive case opposition of object used with transitive verbs creates a telicity contrast, just as in Finnish. An object in Grammar is a Sentence element and part of the sentence predicate. In Linguistics, telicity is the property of a Verb or Verb phrase that presents an action or event as being complete in some sense This is a rough equivalent of the perfect vs. imperfect aspect opposition.

The verbal system lacks a distinctive future tense (the present tense serves here) and features special forms to express an action performed by an undetermined subject (the "impersonal"). According to a tradition that can be tracked back to Aristotle, every sentence can be divided in two main constituents, one being the subject of the sentence and the

Vocabulary

Main article: Estonian vocabulary

Although the Estonian and Germanic languages are of completely different origins, one can identify many similar words in Estonian and English, for example. The Germanic languages are a group of related languages that constitute a branch of the Indo-European (IE Language family. This is primarily due to the fact that the Estonian language has borrowed nearly one third of its vocabulary from Germanic languages, mainly from Low Saxon (Middle Low German) during the period of German rule, and High German (including standard German). The Germanic languages are a group of related languages that constitute a branch of the Indo-European (IE Language family. Middle Low German ( ISO 639 -3 code gml) is a Language that is the descendant of Old Saxon and is the ancestor of modern Low German. The High German languages (in German, Hochdeutsch) are any of the varieties of standard German, Luxembourgish and Standard German ( German: Hochdeutsch) is the standard varieties of the German language used as a Written language, in formal contexts The percentage of Low Saxon and High German loanwords can be estimated at 22-25 percent, with Low Saxon making up about 15 percent.

Language example

Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in Estonian:

Kõik inimesed sünnivad vabadena ja võrdsetena oma väärikuselt ja õigustelt. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights ( UDHR) is a declaration adopted by the United Nations General Assembly ( 10 December 1948 at Palais Neile on antud mõistus ja südametunnistus ja nende suhtumist üksteisesse peab kandma vendluse vaim.

(All people are born free and equal in their dignity and rights. They are given reason and conscience and they shall create their relationships to one another according to the spirit of brotherhood. )

References

  1. ^ Culture and Customs of the Baltic States By Kevin O'Connor; P.126 ISBN 0313331251
  2. ^ Estonia:Identity and Independence By Jean-Jacques p.84 ISBN 9042008903
  3. ^ Encyclopedia of Bilingualism and Bilingual Education By Sylvia Prys Jones, Colin Baker ISBN 1853593621
  4. ^ Russificationat estonica. org
  5. ^ [http://books.google.com/books?id=owQBH74N8CIC&pg Aspects of Altaic Civilization By Denis Sinor] ISBN 0700703802
  6. ^ Dictionary of Languages By Andrew Dalby; p. 182 ISBN 0231115695
  7. ^ Jaan Kross at google. books
  8. ^ Jaan Kaplinski at google. books
  9. ^ a b Mati Hint. Häälikutest sõnadeni. Valgus 1978, Tallinn.

See also

External links

Dictionaries

© 2009 citizendia.org; parts available under the terms of GNU Free Documentation License, from http://en.wikipedia.org
 Dapyx Software network: MP3 Explorer | Ebook Manager | Zenithic