Finnish Possessive Suffixes

Learn how to show possession in Finnish

These Finnish lessons were written by Josh Pirie.

Need more Finnish? Try the Introductory Finnish Language course at Udemy or the audio-visual lessons at FinnishPod101.com

 

---

Finnish Possessives

Possession in Finnish is expressed using either the genitive pronoun before the noun or the possessive suffix at the end of the noun, or both. They are as follows:

minun        ___-ni                    meidän ___-mme

sinun          ___-si                    teidän  ___-nne

hänen        __V-Vn*               heidän   __V-Vn           (where V = any vowel)

In each use, the suffix is added to the form of the noun, in whichever case it happens to be, unless there is an -n or -t ending, of which there happen to be a lot in Finnish. In such cases, the -n or -t drops before the suffix is added. When adding to a nominative or genitive (or accusative that looks like a genitive), strong grade is present or re-inserted. If in the third person, there are already two vowels, then a different ending is added: -nsa/-nsä. "Come to our house!" would then be expressed Tule taloomme! where nominative talo > genitive talon > illative taloon + -mme > taloomme. One could also say Tule meidän taloomme!

*Vowel prolongation is never used in the nominative singular. Use the -nsa/-nsä ending, to avoid making the nominative sound like the illative.

 

---