science

History of the Finnish language

History of the Finnish language is a science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand History of the Finnish language rather than just read about it. In short: The Finnish language is a Finnic language spoken mostly in Finland that descends from Proto-Finnic and in turn from Proto-Uralic. It is closely related to the Estonian language as well as less-spoken languages, such as Karelian and Veps, and is also distantly related to Hungarian.

Key takeaways

History of the Finnish language belongs to science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect History of the Finnish language to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of History of the Finnish language from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

The Finnish language is a Finnic language spoken mostly in Finland that descends from Proto-Finnic and in turn from Proto-Uralic. It is closely related to the Estonian language as well as less-spoken languages, such as Karelian and Veps, and is also distantly related to Hungarian. The history of the Finnish language can be divided into multiple eras. The earliest phase, Early Finnish (varhaissuomi), lasted from its separation from the other Finnic languages sometime around the end of the first millennium AD until 1540. Around this time, the first Finnish texts of note that survive were written, marking the start of the Old Literary Finnish (vanha kirjasuomi) period. This lasted until the early 19th century, when some time around 1810–1820, the development of the Finnish language entered a new phase called Early Modern Finnish (varhaisnykysuomi). This developed into Modern Finnish (nykysuomi) around the 1870s, by 1880 at the latest.

Origins

Finnish belongs to the Uralic language family and more specifically to the Finnic branch of this family. Thus, Finnish has developed from Proto-Finnic, which in turn has developed from Proto-Uralic. Neither Proto-Uralic nor Proto-Finnic was written down, and what is known of them has been derived through historical linguistics. This includes reconstructions, which are traditionally marked with an asterisk (*). Finnish is noted for its conservatism. Many of the features reconstructed to Proto-Uralic, such as an agglutinating morphology, vowel harmony, consonant gradation, invariably initial (primary) stress, and possessive suffixes, are still present in Finnish today. Among the Finnic features that are not found in the other Uralic languages are adjective–noun agreement, the analytic perfect and pluperfect tenses, and possibly the default word order being SVO instead of SOV, although the Finnic word order was likely flexible, as in Finnish today. Proto-Uralic was originally spoken east of the Ural Mountains, but after its dispersal not long before the 2nd millennium BC, Uralic languages had reached as far west as the upper reaches of the rivers Volga and Oka. Slightly after the beginning of the spread of Sámi languages (to southeastern Finland by around 1000 BC and to Central Scandinavia by 200 AD), the Finnic speakers then began to spread along the upper Oka, and the main group reached the northern and western coasts of Estonia around 800 BC. Shortly thereafter, they also reached southwestern and southern Finland. Development of Proto-Finnic into Late Proto-Finnic took place in Northern Estonia and spread across the gulf into southwestern and southern Finland in the Roman Iron Age, marking a second arrival into Finland. The speakers of the earlier Finnic varieties as well as the Sámi-speaking populations that had already settled the same area shifted their language to Late Proto-Finnic. Subsequently, Late Proto-Finnic continued its expansion north of the Gulf of Finland, along the Kokemäenjoki river valley, reaching Tavastia and then east to Karelia by the 8th century AD and Savonia between the 8th and 11th centuries AD. Upon reaching Karelia, Finnic unity began to break down. As they spread, the Finnic speakers assimilated the Sámi-speaking populations living inland, eventually leaving the Sámi languages in what was once their northwestern periphery. The breakup of the Finnic languages can also be studied linguistically. After South Estonian and Livonian branched off, the remaining core of the Finnic languages then split into Northern Finnic (including Finnish) and Central Finnic (including Estonian). Western Finnish (the western dialects of Finnish) represents a separate node in the tree under Northern Finnic. Eastern Finnish (the eastern dialects), also under Northern Finnic, is more closely related to Karelian and Ingrian; they share a common proto-language, known in literature as Proto-Karelian (muinaiskarjala). Therefore, Finnish has effectively developed from two different (albeit closely related) languages melding into one.

Among the sound and grammatical changes that can be noted from Late Proto-Finnic to North Proto-Finnic are (with Finnish reflexes):

*kt, *pt > *ht (*koktu > kohtu) the third-person singular verb ending *-pi (*anta-pi > dialectal antavi, modern standard antaa) *kc > *ks, *pc > *ps (*kakci > kaksi, *lapci > lapsi) *ck > *tk (*pucki > putki) *c > *s (*cika > sika, *keüci > köysi), except in *cc, *cr sporadic *ai > *ei (*haina > heinä, *raici > reisi) *ë (e.g. Estonian õ) > *e (*tërva > terva, *lainëh > laine) development of *ö in non-initial syllables under vowel harmony (*näko > näkö). Estimates put the number of Finnish words inherited from Proto-Uralic at around 300–400; despite their small number, they make up approximately 70–80 percent of average speech. Inherited words include nouns related to relatives, body parts, animals, and plants, along with many basic verbs and most of the pronouns.

Loanwords The oldest loanwords in Finnish were already present in Proto-Uralic, which borrowed words from Indo-Iranian languages. Proto-Finnic has many loanwords from the Baltic (over 250 words), Germanic (over 500) and Slavic languages (perhaps over 100). After Proto-Finnic, Finnish has borrowed extensively from Swedish, accounting for about a half of all loanwords in the language. Furthermore, many words were also borrowed from Middle Low German, even without Swedish mediation. More recently, English has become the most important source of new loanwords, as it has in the rest of the Western world. Loanwords in Finnish, both old and new, include:

In a 2018 article, linguist Kaisa Häkkinen estimated that out of the vocabulary present in a learner's dictionary, 49 percent of words were native, 46 percent were loanwords, and the remaining five percent had a disputed etymology. Out of the native vocabulary, 45 percent were older than Proto-Finnic, 52 percent were from the Proto-Finnic era, and the remaining 3 percent from after Proto-Finnic.

… excerpt ends here. Continue reading the full article.

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with History of the Finnish language

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what History of the Finnish language claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to History of the Finnish language before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about History of the Finnish language ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of History of the Finnish language

In research: History of the Finnish language appears in science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses History of the Finnish language in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: History of the Finnish language is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics Cultural history of Finland, Finnish language, Language histories, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for History of the Finnish language outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study History of the Finnish language in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what History of the Finnish language means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain History of the Finnish language out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is History of the Finnish language in simple terms?

Why does History of the Finnish language matter?

Because it connects several science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study History of the Finnish language?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on History of the Finnish language.