Estonian (
eesti keel; ) is the official language of
EstoniaEstonia , officially the Republic of Estonia , is a country in Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by the Gulf of Finland, to the west by the Baltic Sea, to the south by Latvia , and to the east by the Russian Federation...
, spoken by about 1.1 million people in Estonia and tens of thousands in various
émigréÉmigré is a French term that literally refers to a person who has "migrated out," but often carries a connotation of politico-social self-exile....
communities. It is an
Uralic languageThe Uralic languages constitute a language family of 39 languages spoken by approximately 25 million people. The healthiest Uralic languages in terms of the number of native speakers are Hungarian, Finnish, Estonian, Mari and Udmurt...
and is closely related to
FinnishFinnish is the language spoken by the majority of the population in Finland and by ethnic Finns outside of Finland. It is one of the official languages of Finland and an official minority language in Sweden. In Sweden, both standard Finnish and Meänkieli, a Finnish dialect, are spoken...
.
One distinctive feature that has caused a great amount of interest in
linguistsLinguistics is the scientific study of natural language. Linguistics encompasses a number of sub-fields. An important topical division is between the study of language structure and the study of meaning...
is that Estonian has what is traditionally seen as three degrees of
phonemeIn a language or dialect, a phoneme is the smallest segmental unit of sound employed to form meaningful contrasts between utterances....
length: short, long, and "overlong", such that , and are distinct. In actuality, the distinction is not purely in the phoneme length, and the underlying phonological mechanism is still disputed.
State Language
Kas siis selle maa keel
Laulutuules ei või
Taevani tõustes üles
Igavikku omale otsida?
In English:
Cannot the tongue of this land
In the wind 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.
Kristjan Jaak PetersonKristjan Jaak Peterson was an Estonian poet, commonly regarded as a herald of Estonian national literature and the founder of modern Estonian poetry. His literary career was cut short by the tuberculosis that killed him at the age of 21. His birthday on March 14 is celebrated in Estonia as the...
(1801–22) the first student at the then German-language
University of TartuThe University of Tartu is a classical university in the city of Tartu, Estonia. Regarded by many Estonians as the country's "national university", it is the highest-ranked university in Estonia as well as one of the highest-ranked in former Eastern Europe...
to acknowledge his Estonian origin, is commonly regarded as a herald of
Estonian national literatureEstonian literature refers to literature written in the Estonian language The domination of Estonia after the Northern Crusades, from the 13th century to 1918 by Germany, Sweden, and Russia resulted few early written literary works in Estonian language. The oldest records of written Estonian date...
and considered the founder of modern Estonian poetry. His birthday on March 14 is celebrated in
EstoniaEstonia , officially the Republic of Estonia , is a country in Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by the Gulf of Finland, to the west by the Baltic Sea, to the south by Latvia , and to the east by the Russian Federation...
as the
Mother TongueA first language is the language a human being learns from birth...
Day.
The domination of
EstoniaEstonia , officially the Republic of Estonia , is a country in Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by the Gulf of Finland, to the west by the Baltic Sea, to the south by Latvia , and to the east by the Russian Federation...
after the
Northern CrusadesThe Northern Crusades or Baltic Crusades were crusades undertaken by the Christian kings of Denmark and Sweden, the German Livonian and Teutonic military orders, and their allies against the pagan peoples of Northern Europe around the southern and eastern shores of the Baltic Sea...
, from the 13th century to 1918 by
DenmarkDenmark is a Scandinavian country in Northern Europe and the senior member of the Kingdom of Denmark. It is the southernmost of the Nordic countries; southwest of Sweden and south of Norway, and it is bordered to the south by Germany. Denmark borders both the Baltic and the North Sea...
,
GermanyGermany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a country in Central Europe. It is bordered to the north by the North Sea, Denmark, and the Baltic Sea; to the east by Poland and the Czech Republic; to the south by Austria and Switzerland; and to the west by France, Luxembourg, Belgium,...
,
SwedenSweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe...
, and
RussiaRussia , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia . It is a semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
resulted in few early written literary works in the Estonian language. Writings in Estonian became significant only in the 19th century with the spread of the ideas of the
Age of EnlightenmentThe Age of Enlightenment, or simply The Enlightenment, is a term used to describe a time in Western philosophy and cultural life, centered upon the eighteenth century, in which reason was advocated as the primary source and legitimacy for authority....
, during the Estophile Enlightenment Period (1750–1840). 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 13th century.
After the Estonian War of Independence, the Estonian language became the state language of the newly independent country. When Estonia was invaded and occupied by the Soviet Union in
World War IIWorld War II, or the Second World War , was a global military conflict which involved a majority of the world's nations, including all great powers, organized into two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, the status of the Estonian language changed to the first of two official languages (Russian being the other one). In the second half of the 1970s, the pressure of bilingualism intensified, resulting in widespread knowledge of Russian throughout the country. The Russian language was termed as ‘the language of friendship of nations’ and was taught to Estonian children as early as in kindergarten. Although teaching Estonian to non-Estonians in schools was compulsory, in practice learning the language was often considered unnecessary. During the
Perestroikais the Russian term for the political and economic reforms introduced in June 1987 by the Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev...
era The Law on the Status of the Estonian Language was adopted in January 1989. The collapse of the
Soviet UnionThe Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. The name is a translation of the , tr. Soyuz Sovetskikh Sotsialisticheskikh Respublik, abbreviated СССР, SSSR. The common short name is Soviet Union, from , Sovetskiy Soyuz...
led to the restoration of
Republic of EstoniaEstonia , officially the Republic of Estonia , is a country in Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by the Gulf of Finland, to the west by the Baltic Sea, to the south by Latvia , and to the east by the Russian Federation...
's independence. Estonian went back to being the only state language in Estonia.
Estonian literature
The oldest records of written Estonian date from the 13th century.
Originates Livoniae in
Chronicle of Henry of LivoniaThe Chronicle of Henry of Livonia is a document describing historic events in Livonia and surrounding areas from 1180 to 1227. Apart from the few references in the Primary Chronicle compiled in Kievan Rus in the twelfth century, it is the oldest known written document about the history of these...
contains Estonian place names, words and fragments of sentences. The earliest extant samples of connected Estonian are the so-called Kullamaa prayers dating from 1524 and 1528. 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 ReformationThe Protestant Reformation was a Christian reform movement in Europe which is generally deemed to have begun with Martin Luther's Ninety-Five Theses in 1517 although a number of precursors such as Jan Hus predate that event...
period. For the use of priests an Estonian grammar was printed in German in 1637. The New Testament was translated into
southern EstonianThe Võro language is a language belonging to the Baltic-Finnic branch of the Finno-Ugric languages. Traditionally it has been considered a dialect of South Estonian dialect group of the Estonian language, but nowadays it has its own literary language and is in search of official recognition as an...
in 1686 (northern Estonian, 1715). 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).
The the birth of native Estonian literature was in 1810 to 1820 when the patriotic and philosophical poems by
Kristjan Jaak PetersonKristjan Jaak Peterson was an Estonian poet, commonly regarded as a herald of Estonian national literature and the founder of modern Estonian poetry. His literary career was cut short by the tuberculosis that killed him at the age of 21. His birthday on March 14 is celebrated in Estonia as the...
were published. From 1525 to 1917 14 503 titles were published in Estonia, as opposed to the 23 868 titles which were published between 1918 and 1940.
In modern times
Jaan KrossJaan Kross was the most eminent contemporary Estonian writer.-Early life:Born in Tallinn, Estonia, studied Jacob Westholm´s Grammar school, Kross attended the University of Tartu and graduated from its School of Law...
and
Jaan KaplinskiJaan Kaplinski is an Estonian poet, philosopher, and culture critic. Kaplinski is known for his independent mind, focus on global issues and support for left-wing/liberal thinking...
remain as two of
EstoniaEstonia , officially the Republic of Estonia , is a country in Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by the Gulf of Finland, to the west by the Baltic Sea, to the south by Latvia , and to the east by the Russian Federation...
's best known and most translated writers.
Classification
Estonian belongs to the Baltic Finnic branch of the
Uralic languagesThe Uralic languages constitute a language family of 39 languages spoken by approximately 25 million people. The healthiest Uralic languages in terms of the number of native speakers are Hungarian, Finnish, Estonian, Mari and Udmurt...
. Estonian is thus closely related to
FinnishFinnish is the language spoken by the majority of the population in Finland and by ethnic Finns outside of Finland. It is one of the official languages of Finland and an official minority language in Sweden. In Sweden, both standard Finnish and Meänkieli, a Finnish dialect, are spoken...
, spoken on the other side of the
Gulf of FinlandThe Gulf of Finland is the easternmost arm of the Baltic Sea that extends between Finland and Estonia all the way to Saint Petersburg in Russia, where the river Neva drains into it. Other major cities around the gulf include Helsinki and Tallinn...
, and is one of the few languages of Europe that is not
Indo-EuropeanThe Indo-European languages are a family of several hundred related languages and dialects, including most major languages of Europe, Iran, and northern India, and historically also predominant in Anatolia and Central Asia...
. Despite some overlaps in the vocabulary due to borrowings, in terms of its origin, Estonian is not proven to be related to its nearest neighbours,
SwedishSwedish is a North Germanic language, spoken by approximately 10 million people, predominantly in Sweden and parts of Finland, especially along the coast and on the Åland islands. It is to a considerable extent mutually intelligible with Norwegian and to a lesser extent with Danish...
,
LatvianLatvian is the official state language of Latvia. It is also sometimes referred to as Lettish. There are about 1.4 million native Latvian speakers in Latvia and about 150,000 abroad. The Latvian language has a relatively large number of non-native speakers, atypical for a small language...
and
RussianRussian is the most geographically widespread language of Eurasia, the most widely spoken of the Slavic languages, and the largest native language in Europe...
, which are all Indo-European languages.
Estonian is distantly related to
HungarianHungarian is a Uralic language unrelated to most other languages in Europe. It is mainly spoken in Hungary and by the Hungarian minorities in the seven neighbouring countries...
(there is no mutual intelligibility between the two). It has been influenced by
SwedishSwedish is a North Germanic language, spoken by approximately 10 million people, predominantly in Sweden and parts of Finland, especially along the coast and on the Åland islands. It is to a considerable extent mutually intelligible with Norwegian and to a lesser extent with Danish...
,
GermanGerman is a West Germanic language, thus related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. It is one of the world's major languages and the most widely spoken first language in the European Union. Around the world, German is spoken by approximately 105 million native speakers and also by...
(initially
Middle Low GermanMiddle Low German is a language that is the descendant of Old Saxon and is the ancestor of modern Low German. It served as the international lingua franca of the Hanseatic League...
, later also
standard GermanStandard German is the standard variety of the German language used as a written language, in formal contexts, and for communication between different dialect areas...
),
RussianRussian is the most geographically widespread language of Eurasia, the most widely spoken of the Slavic languages, and the largest native language in Europe...
, and
LatvianLatvian is the official state language of Latvia. It is also sometimes referred to as Lettish. There are about 1.4 million native Latvian speakers in Latvia and about 150,000 abroad. The Latvian language has a relatively large number of non-native speakers, atypical for a small language...
, though it is not related to them
geneticallyA language family is a group of languages related by descent from a common ancestor, called the proto-language of that family.As with biological families, the evidence of relationship is observable shared characteristics...
.
Like Finnish and Hungarian, Estonian is an
agglutinative languageAn agglutinative language is a language that uses agglutination extensively: most words are formed by joining morphemes together. This term was introduced by Wilhelm von Humboldt in 1836 to classify languages from a morphological point of view...
, but unlike them, it has lost the
vowel harmonyVowel harmony is a type of long-distance assimilatory phonological process involving vowels that occurs in some languages. In languages with vowel harmony, there are constraints on what vowels may be found near each other....
of Proto-Uralic, although in older texts the vowel harmony is still to be recognized. Furthermore, the
apocopeIn phonology, apocope is the loss of one or more sounds from the end of a word, and especially the loss of an unstressed vowel.-Historical sound change:...
of word-final sounds is extensive and has caused a shift from a purely agglutinative to a
fusional languageA fusional language is a type of synthetic language, distinguished from agglutinative languages by its tendency to overlay many morphemes in a way which can be difficult to segment....
. The basic word order is Subject Verb Object.
Dialects
The Estonian dialects are divided into two groups – the northern and southern dialects, usually associated with the cities of
TallinnTallinn is the capital and largest city of Estonia. It occupies a surface of in which 405,867 inhabitants live. It is situated on the northern coast of the country, on the banks of the Gulf of Finland, south of Helsinki.-Historical names:...
in the north and
TartuFor the French captain, see Jean-François TartuTartu is the second largest city of Estonia. In contrast to Estonia's political and financial capital Tallinn, Tartu is often considered the intellectual and cultural hub, especially since it is home to Estonia's oldest and most renowned university....
in the south, in addition to a distinct
kirderanniku dialect, that of the
northeastern coast of Estonia.
The northern group consists of the
keskmurre or middle dialect that is also the basis for the standard language, the
läänemurre or western dialect, roughly corresponding to Läänemaa and Pärnumaa, the
saarte murre (islands') dialect of
SaaremaaSaaremaa is the largest island belonging to Estonia, measuring 2,673 km². The main island of Saare County, it is located in the Baltic Sea, south of Hiiumaa island, and belongs to the West Estonian Archipelago...
and
HiiumaaHiiumaa is the second largest island belonging to Estonia. It is located in the Baltic Sea, north of the island of Saaremaa, a part of the west Estonian archipelago . Its largest town is Kärdla....
and the
idamurre or eastern dialect on the northwestern
shoreA shore or shoreline is the fringe of land at the edge of a large body of water, such as an ocean, sea, or lake. In Physical Oceanography a shore is the wider fringe that is geologically modified by the action of the body of water past and present, while the beach is at the edge of the shore,...
of Lake Peipsi.
The southern group consists of the Tartu, Mulgi, Võru (Võro) and Setu (Seto) dialects. These are sometimes considered either variants of a
South Estonian languageSouth Estonian emerged in the 17th century as a distinct language in Swedish Livonia aside the North Estonian language spoken in Swedish Estonia.The first South Estonian grammar was compiled by Johann Gutslaff in 1648....
, or separate languages altogether. Also,
SetoSeto or Setu language is a dialect of the Finnic South Estonian or Võro language , spoken by about 5,000 people...
is not usually considered a dialect of Estonian, but rather a variant of
VõroThe Võro language is a language belonging to the Baltic-Finnic branch of the Finno-Ugric languages. Traditionally it has been considered a dialect of South Estonian dialect group of the Estonian language, but nowadays it has its own literary language and is in search of official recognition as an...
.
Alphabet
Like Finnish, Estonian employs the
Latin alphabetThe Latin alphabet, also called the Roman alphabet, is the most widely used alphabetic writing system in the world today. It evolved from the western variety of the Greek alphabet called the Cumaean alphabet, and was initially developed by the ancient Romans to write the Latin language.During the...
, in addition to which the
Estonian alphabetThe Estonian alphabet is used for writing the Estonian language and is based on the Latin alphabet, with German influence. As such, the Estonian alphabet has the letters Ä, Ö, and Ü , which represent the vowel sounds , and , respectively...
contains letters
ä,
ö,
ü, and
õ, plus the later additions
š and
ž. 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.
Ö, and
ü are pronounced similarly to their equivalents in Swedish and German. Unlike in standard German but like Finnish,
Ä is pronounced [æ], as in English
mat. The vowels Ä, Ö and Ü are clearly separate phonemes and inherent in Estonian, although the letter shapes come from German. The letter
õ denotes , unrounded , or a
close-mid back unrounded vowelThe close-mid back unrounded vowel is a type of vowel sound, used in some spoken languages. Its symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet is , called "ram's horns". It is distinct from the symbol for the voiced velar fricative, , which has a descender....
. (It has a different sound from the same letter in
PortuguesePortuguese is a Romance language that originated in what is now Galicia and northern Portugal. It is derived from the Latin spoken by the romanized Pre-Roman peoples of the Iberian Peninsula around 2000 years ago...
. It is similar to the
KazakhKazakh is a Turkic language closely related to Kyrgyz and Karakalpak.Kazakh is an agglutinative language, and it employs vowel harmony.-Geographic distribution:...
ұ and the
VietnameseVietnamese , formerly known under French colonization as Annamese , is the national and official language of Vietnam...
ơO is the fifteenth letter of the basic modern Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled o; the plural is oes, though this is rare.- History :...
, and it is also close to the
TurkishTurkish is spoken as a first language by over 63 million people worldwide, making it the most commonly spoken of the Turkic languages. Its speakers are located predominantly in Turkey and Cyprus, with smaller groups in Iraq, Greece, Bulgaria, the Republic of Macedonia, Kosovo, Albania and other...
ıThe Turkish alphabet, which is a variant of the Latin alphabet, includes two distinct versions of the letter I, one dotted and the other dotless....
and the Russian
ы.)
Orthography
Estonian orthography is essentially phonemic with each
phonemeIn a language or dialect, a phoneme is the smallest segmental unit of sound employed to form meaningful contrasts between utterances....
of the language represented by exactly one
graphemeA grapheme is a fundamental unit in a written language. Examples of graphemes include alphabetic letters, Chinese characters, numerical digits, punctuation marks, and the individual symbols of any of the world's writing systems, although arguably a diacritical mark or ancillary glyph does not...
. Exceptions to this derive from historical agreements: for example the initial letter 'h' in words, preservation of the morpheme in
declensionIn linguistics, declension is the occurrence of inflection in nouns, pronouns and adjectives, indicating such features as number , case , gender, and possession. Declension occurs in a great many of the world's languages, and features very prominently in many European languages, but is much less...
of the word (writing b, g, d in places where p, k, t is pronounced) and in the use of 'i' and 'j'. 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 fricativeThe voiceless glottal transition, commonly called a "fricative", is a type of sound used in some spoken languages which often behaves like a consonant, but sometimes behaves more like a vowel, or is indeterminate in its behavior...
, as in
pashaPasha refers to:* Pasha, a high rank in the Ottoman Empire* Pasha, the Kurdish term for a king* Pasha, a GWR Iron Duke Class steam locomotive.* Pasha, a Russian diminutive form of the given name Pavel...
(
pas-'ha); this also applies to some foreign names.
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 ForseliusBengt Gottfried Forselius was a founder of public education in Estonia, author of the first Estonian language ABC-book, and creator of a spelling system which made the teaching and learning of Estonian easier...
and Johann Hornung based on
standard GermanGerman is a West Germanic language, thus related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. It is one of the world's major languages and the most widely spoken first language in the European Union. Around the world, German is spoken by approximately 105 million native speakers and also by...
orthography. Earlier writing in Estonian had by and large used an
ad hoc orthography based on
LatinLatin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. Through the Roman conquest, Latin spread throughout the Mediterranean and a large part of Europe...
and
Middle Low GermanMiddle Low German is a language that is the descendant of Old Saxon and is the ancestor of modern Low German. It served as the international lingua franca of the Hanseatic League...
orthography. 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
PärnuPärnu is a city in southwestern Estonia on the coast of Pärnu Bay, an inlet of the Gulf of Riga in the Baltic Sea. It is a popular summer vacation resort with many hotels, restaurants, and large beaches. The Pärnu River flows through the city...
) and "y" instead of "õ" (e.g., Pylva instead of the correct
PõlvaPõlva , is the capital of Põlva County , one of 15 counties of Estonia. The county is situated in south-eastern part of the country and borders Tartu, Valga and Võru counties...
). Even in the
Encyclopædia BritannicaThe Encyclopædia Britannica is a general English-language encyclopaedia published by Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., a privately held company. The articles in the Britannica are aimed at educated adult readers, and written by a staff of about 100 full-time editors and more than...
one can find "ostrov Khiuma", where "ostrov" means "island" in Russian and "Khiuma" is back-transliteration from Russian instead of correct "
HiiumaaHiiumaa is the second largest island belonging to Estonia. It is located in the Baltic Sea, north of the island of Saaremaa, a part of the west Estonian archipelago . Its largest town is Kärdla....
" (Hiiumaa>Хийума(а)>Khiuma).
Vowels
|
Front |
Back |
|
Unrounded |
Rounded |
Unrounded |
Rounded |
| Close |
|
|
|
|
| Mid |
|
|
|
|
| Open |
|
|
|
|
There are eighteen phonemic monophthongs, with three
phonetic lengthsIn linguistics, vowel length is the perceived duration of a vowel sound. Often the chroneme, or the "longness", acts like a consonant, and may etymologically be one such as in Australian English...
. 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 5 segmental diphthongs, and polysyllablic vowel clusters are also found. There are very few instances of vowel allophony: 'ä' may have pronunciations and , and the phoneme is pronounced as the diphthong .
Characteristic to Estonian is the vowel
õ"Õ", or "õ" is a composition of the Latin letter O with the diacritic mark tilde.The HTML entity is Õ for Õ and õ for õ.-Estonian:...
, a
close-mid near-back unrounded vowelThe close-mid back unrounded vowel is a type of vowel sound, used in some spoken languages. Its symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet is , called "ram's horns". It is distinct from the symbol for the voiced velar fricative, , which has a descender....
, which is farther back than the
schwaIn linguistics, specifically phonetics and phonology, schwa can mean the following:*An unstressed and toneless neutral vowel sound in some languages, often but not necessarily a mid-central vowel...
, but unrounded unlike .
Consonants
|
BilabialIn phonetics, a bilabial consonant is a consonant articulated with both lips. The bilabial consonants identified by the International Phonetic Alphabet are:...
|
Labio-
dentalIn phonetics, labiodentals are consonants articulated with the lower lip and the upper teeth. The labiodental consonants identified by the International Phonetic Alphabet are:...
|
AlveolarAlveolar consonants are articulated with the tongue against or close to the superior alveolar ridge, which is called that because it contains the alveoli of the superior teeth...
|
Post-
alveolarPostalveolar consonants are consonants articulated with the tongue near or touching the back of the alveolar ridge, further back in the mouth than the alveolar consonants, which are at the ridge itself, but not as far back as the hard palate .Among the fricatives and affricates, a subtype called...
|
PalatalPalatal consonants are consonants articulated with the body of the tongue raised against the hard palate...
|
VelarVelars are consonants articulated with the back part of the tongue against the soft palate, the back part of the roof of the mouth, known also as the velum)....
|
GlottalGlottal consonants, also called laryngeal consonants, are consonants articulated with the glottis. Many phoneticians consider them, or at least the so-called fricatives, to be transitional states of the glottis without a point of articulation as other consonants have; in fact, some do not consider...
|
| Nasal A nasal consonant is produced with a lowered velum in the mouth, allowing air to escape freely through the nose. The oral cavity still acts as a resonance chamber for the sound, but the air does not escape through the mouth as it is blocked by the lips or tongue...
|
| |
| |
|
1 |
|
| Plosive |
| |
| |
|
| |
| Fricative Fricatives are consonants produced by forcing air through a narrow channel made by placing two articulators close together. These may be the lower lip against the upper teeth, in the case of ; the back of the tongue against the soft palate, in the case of German , the final consonant of Bach; or...
|
|
|
|
| |
|
|
| Approximant Approximants are speech sounds that could be regarded as intermediate between vowels and "typical" consonants. In the articulation of approximants, articulatory organs produce a narrowing of the vocal tract, but leave enough space for air to flow without much audible turbulence. Approximants are...
|
|
|
| |
| |
|
| Trill In phonetics, a trill is a consonantal sound produced by vibrations between the articulator and the place of articulation. Standard Spanish <rr> as in perro is an alveolar trill, while in Parisian French it is almost always uvular....
|
|
|
| |
|
Notes:
- only appears as an allophone
In phonetics, an allophone is one of several similar speech sounds that belong to the same phoneme. A phoneme is an abstract unit of speech sound that can distinguish words: That is, changing a phoneme in a word can produce another word...
of before .
- and 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.
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 genitive). 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
alternateIn linguistics, an alternation is the phenomenon of a phoneme or morpheme exhibiting variation in its phonological realization. Each of the various realizations is called an alternant...
between various grades of sound length and sound quality in different grammatical forms of a word; see also vowel gradation,
consonant gradationConsonant gradation is a type of consonant mutation, in which consonants alternate between various "grades". It is found in some Finno-Lappic languages such as Finnish, Estonian and Northern Sámi, as well as in the Samoyed language Nganasan. Of the Baltic-Finnic languages, the Votic language is...
, lenition.
Quantitative changes (strong grade : weak grade)
- alternation of overlong and long vowels aaa : aa, eee : ee, ooo : oo, uuu : uu (saal : saali, keelama : keelata, kool : kooli, suur : suure)
- alternation of overlong and long consonants nnn : nn, lll : ll (linn : linna, kallama : kallata)
- alternation of long and short consonants pp : p, tt : t, kk : k, ss : s (sepp : sepa, võtta : võtan, hakkan : hakata, kirss : kirsi)
- alternation of strong and weak consonants p : b, t : d, k : g (kupja : kubjas, kartma : kardan, vilkuda : vilgub)
Qualitative changes (strong grade : weak grade)
- alternation of long and lowered long vowels iu : eo, ua : oa, ue : oe, uu : oo, üi : öe (pidu : peo, tuba : toa, lugema : loen, sugu : soo, süsi : söe)
- alternation of weak and assimilated weak consonants b : m, d : n/l/r, s : r (hamba : hammas, kandma : kannan, vars : varre)
- alternation of weak and lenited weak consonants b : v, d : j, g : j (kaebama : kaevata, rada : raja, märg : märja)
- alternation of weak and elided weak consonants b : Ø, d/t : Ø, g/k : Ø, s : Ø (tuba : toa, leht : lehe, arg : ara, mesi : mee)
Partition of grades in declension
- singular nominative and singular genitive have the opposite grades (leht : lehe – strong : weak, hammas : hamba – weak : strong)
- singular nominative and singular partitive have the same grades (leht : lehte – strong : strong, hammas : hammast – weak : weak)
- plural partitive has the strong grade (lehti – strong, hambaid – strong)
Partition of grades in conjugation
- -da infinitive and present tense have the opposite grades (lugeda : loen – strong : weak, hakata : hakkan – weak : strong)
- -ma infinitive has the strong grade (lugema – strong, hakkama – strong)
- -tud participle has the weak grade (loetud – weak, hakatud – weak)
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
Typologically, Estonian represents a transitional form from an agglutinating language to a
fusional languageA fusional language is a type of synthetic language, distinguished from agglutinative languages by its tendency to overlay many morphemes in a way which can be difficult to segment....
. Over the course of Estonian history,
GermanGerman is a West Germanic language, thus related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. It is one of the world's major languages and the most widely spoken first language in the European Union. Around the world, German is spoken by approximately 105 million native speakers and also by...
has exercised a strong influence on Estonian, both in vocabulary and syntax.
In Estonian nouns and pronouns do not have
grammatical genderIn linguistics, grammatical genders, sometimes also called noun classes, are classes of nouns reflected in the behavior of associated words; every noun must belong to one of the classes and there should be very few which belong to several classes at once....
, but nouns and adjectives decline in fourteen cases: nominative, genitive,
partitiveThe partitive case is a grammatical case which denotes "partialness", "without result", or "without specific identity". It is also used in contexts where a subgroup is selected from a larger group, or with numbers.- Finnish :...
, illative, inessive,
elativeSee Elative for disambiguation.Elative is a locative case with the basic meaning "out of".In Finnish elative is typically formed by adding "sta/stä", in Estonian by adding "st" to the genitive stem...
, 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). Thus the illative for "a yellow house" (
kollane maja) – "into a yellow house" is (
kollasesse majja). With respect to the Proto-Finnic language, elision has occurred; thus, the actual case marker may be absent, but the stem is changed, cf.
maja – majja and Pohjanmaa dialect of Finnish
maja – majahan.
The direct object of the verb appears either in the
accusativeThe accusative case of a noun is the grammatical case used to mark the direct object of a transitive verb. The same case is used in many languages for the objects of prepositions...
(for total objects) or in the partitive (for partial objects). The accusative coincides with the genitive in the singular and with nominative in the plural. Accusative vs. partitive case opposition of
objectAn object in grammar is a sentence element and is often part of the sentence predicate. It denotes somebody or something involved in the subject's "performance" of the verb...
used with transitive verbs creates a
telicityIn linguistics, telicity is the property of a verb or verb phrase that presents an action or event as being complete in some sense...
contrast, just as in Finnish. 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
subjectThe subject is one of the two main constituents of a clause, according to a tradition that can be tracked back to Aristotle. The other constituent is the predicate...
(the "impersonal").
Vocabulary
Although the Estonian and Germanic languages are of completely different origins, one can identify many similar words in Estonian and English, for example. This is primarily due to the fact that the Estonian language has borrowed nearly one third of its vocabulary from
Germanic languagesThe Germanic languages are a group of related languages that constitute a branch of the Indo-European language family. The common ancestor of all the languages in this branch is Proto-Germanic, spoken in approximately the mid-1st millennium BC in Iron Age northern Europe...
, mainly from Low Saxon (
Middle Low GermanMiddle Low German is a language that is the descendant of Old Saxon and is the ancestor of modern Low German. It served as the international lingua franca of the Hanseatic League...
) during the period of German rule, and High German (including
standard GermanStandard German is the standard variety of the German language used as a written language, in formal contexts, and for communication between different dialect areas...
). The percentage of Low Saxon and High German loanwords can be estimated at 22–25 percent, with Low Saxon making up about 15 percent.
Ex nihilo lexical enrichment
Estonian language planners such as Ado Grenzstein (a journalist active in Estonia in the 1870s-90s) tried to use formation
ex nihiloThe Latin phrase ex nihilo means "out of nothing". It often appears in conjunction with the concept of creation, as in creatio ex nihilo, meaning "creation out of nothing" — chiefly in in philosophical or theological contexts, but also occurs in other fields.In theology, the common phrase creatio...
, Urschöpfung, i.e. they created new words out of nothing. Examples are Ado Grenzstein's coinages
kabe ‘draughts, chequers’ and
male ‘chess’.
"The most famous reformer of Estonian,
Johannes AavikJohannes Aavik was an Estonian philologist and Fennophile who played a significant role in the modernization and development of the Estonian language.-Education and Career:...
(1880–1973), also used creations ex nihilo (cf. ‘free constructions’, Tauli 1977), along with other sources of lexical enrichment such as derivations, compositions and loanwords (often from Finnish; cf. Saareste and Raun 1965: 76). Aavik belonged to the so-called Noor-Eesti (‘Young Estonia’) movement, which appeared in Tartu, a university town in south-eastern Estonia, around 1905 (for discussion, see Raun 1991). In Aavik’s dictionary (1921), which lists approximately 4000 words, there are many words which were (allegedly) created ex nihilo. Consider •
ese ‘object’, •
kolp ‘skull’, •
liibuma ‘to cling’, •
naasma ‘to return, come back’, •
nõme ‘stupid, dull’, •
range ‘strict’, •
reetma ‘to betray’, •
solge ‘slim, flexible, graceful’ (which did not gain currency, cf. Contemporary Estonian
graatsiline ‘graceful’, although the word itself, interestingly, is used for a certain kind of parasitic worm, namely the
Ascaris lumbricoidesAscaris lumbricoides is the member of the Ascaris family responsible for the disease ascariasis.It can reach a length of up to 35 cm.- Life cycle :...
), and •
veenma ‘to convince’. Other Aavikisms ex nihilo (not appearing in Aavik 1921) include •
nentima ‘to admit, state’, •
nördima ‘to grow indignant’, •
süüme ‘conscience’, and •
tõik ‘fact’."
"Note, however, that many of the coinages that have been considered (often by Aavik himself) as words concocted ex nihilo could well have been influenced by foreign lexical items, for example words from
RussianRussian is the most geographically widespread language of Eurasia, the most widely spoken of the Slavic languages, and the largest native language in Europe...
,
GermanGerman is a West Germanic language, thus related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. It is one of the world's major languages and the most widely spoken first language in the European Union. Around the world, German is spoken by approximately 105 million native speakers and also by...
,
FrenchFrench is a Romance language globally spoken by about 65 million people as a first language , by 50 million as a second language, and by about another 200 million people as an acquired foreign language, with significant speakers in 57 countries. Most native speakers of the language live in France,...
,
FinnishFinnish is the language spoken by the majority of the population in Finland and by ethnic Finns outside of Finland. It is one of the official languages of Finland and an official minority language in Sweden. In Sweden, both standard Finnish and Meänkieli, a Finnish dialect, are spoken...
,
EnglishEnglish is a West Germanic language that developed in England during the Anglo-Saxon era. As a result of the military, economic, scientific, political, and cultural influence of the British Empire during the 18th, 19th, and early 20th centuries, and of the United States since the mid 20th century,...
and
SwedishSwedish is a North Germanic language, spoken by approximately 10 million people, predominantly in Sweden and parts of Finland, especially along the coast and on the Åland islands. It is to a considerable extent mutually intelligible with Norwegian and to a lesser extent with Danish...
. Aavik had a broad classical education and knew Ancient
GreekGreek , an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages, is the language of the Greeks. Native to the southern Balkans, it has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning 34 centuries of written records. In its ancient form, it is the language of classical...
,
LatinLatin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. Through the Roman conquest, Latin spread throughout the Mediterranean and a large part of Europe...
and
FrenchFrench is a Romance language globally spoken by about 65 million people as a first language , by 50 million as a second language, and by about another 200 million people as an acquired foreign language, with significant speakers in 57 countries. Most native speakers of the language live in France,...
. Consider •
relv ‘weapon’ versus
EnglishEnglish is a West Germanic language that developed in England during the Anglo-Saxon era. As a result of the military, economic, scientific, political, and cultural influence of the British Empire during the 18th, 19th, and early 20th centuries, and of the United States since the mid 20th century,...
revolver, •
roim ‘crime’ versus
EnglishEnglish is a West Germanic language that developed in England during the Anglo-Saxon era. As a result of the military, economic, scientific, political, and cultural influence of the British Empire during the 18th, 19th, and early 20th centuries, and of the United States since the mid 20th century,...
crime, •
siiras ‘sincere’ versus
EnglishEnglish is a West Germanic language that developed in England during the Anglo-Saxon era. As a result of the military, economic, scientific, political, and cultural influence of the British Empire during the 18th, 19th, and early 20th centuries, and of the United States since the mid 20th century,...
sincere/
serious •
embama ‘to embrace’ versus
EnglishEnglish is a West Germanic language that developed in England during the Anglo-Saxon era. As a result of the military, economic, scientific, political, and cultural influence of the British Empire during the 18th, 19th, and early 20th centuries, and of the United States since the mid 20th century,...
embrace, and •
taunima ‘to condemn, disapprove’ versus
FinnishFinnish is the language spoken by the majority of the population in Finland and by ethnic Finns outside of Finland. It is one of the official languages of Finland and an official minority language in Sweden. In Sweden, both standard Finnish and Meänkieli, a Finnish dialect, are spoken...
tuomita ‘to judge’ (these Aavikisms appear in Aavik’s 1921 dictionary). Consider also •
evima ‘to have, possess, own’ (cf. also Estonian
omama ‘to own’, and
mul on, lit. ‘to me is’, i.e. ‘for me there is’, meaning ‘I have’) versus
EnglishEnglish is a West Germanic language that developed in England during the Anglo-Saxon era. As a result of the military, economic, scientific, political, and cultural influence of the British Empire during the 18th, 19th, and early 20th centuries, and of the United States since the mid 20th century,...
have; •
laup ‘forehead’ versus
RussianRussian is the most geographically widespread language of Eurasia, the most widely spoken of the Slavic languages, and the largest native language in Europe...
лоб lob ‘forehead’; •
mõrv ‘murder’ and
mõrvama ‘to murder’ versus
EnglishEnglish is a West Germanic language that developed in England during the Anglo-Saxon era. As a result of the military, economic, scientific, political, and cultural influence of the British Empire during the 18th, 19th, and early 20th centuries, and of the United States since the mid 20th century,...
murder (these Aavikisms do not appear in Aavik 1921); and •
laip ‘corpse’ versus
GermanGerman is a West Germanic language, thus related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. It is one of the world's major languages and the most widely spoken first language in the European Union. Around the world, German is spoken by approximately 105 million native speakers and also by...
Leib ‘body’ and
GermanGerman is a West Germanic language, thus related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. It is one of the world's major languages and the most widely spoken first language in the European Union. Around the world, German is spoken by approximately 105 million native speakers and also by...
Leiche ‘body, corpse’. These words might be better regarded as a peculiar manifestation of morpho-phonemic adaptation of a foreign lexical item. The often irregular and arbitrary sound changes could then be explained not as subconscious foreign influence but rather as conscious manipulation by the coiner. Aavik seems to have paid little attention to the origin of his neologisms. On occasion, he replaced existing native words or expressions with neologisms of foreign descent. Therefore, Aavik cannot be considered a purist in the traditional sense, i.e. he was not ‘anti-foreignisms/loanwords’ as such."
Language example
Article 1 of the
Universal Declaration of Human RightsThe Universal Declaration of Human Rights is a declaration adopted by the United Nations General Assembly . The Guinness Book of Records describes the UDHR as the "Most Translated Document" in the world...
in Estonian:
Kõik inimesed sünnivad vabadena ja võrdsetena oma väärikuselt ja õigustelt. 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.)
See also
- Swadesh list for Finnic languages
- Swadesh list for Finno-Ugric languages
External links
Dictionaries
Recordings