Finnish (suomi)

Finnish is a Finno-Ugric language spoken by about 6 million people mainly in Finland. Finnish has official status in Sweden, where about 200,000 people speak it, and is also spoken in Estonia and Russia in areas bordering Finland. In northern Norway a language closely related to Finnish, Kven, is spoken by about 8,000 people.

Finnish starting to appear in writing during the 16th century. The first piece of Finnish literature was a translation of the New Testament by Michael Agricola which was published in 1548.

Until 1809 Finland was a part of Sweden and Swedish was the official language. From 1863 the Finnish language could be used along with Swedish when dealing with authorities. Civil servants were obliged to use the Finnish language and issue documents in Finnish from 1883. In 1892 Finnish became an official language and gained a status comparable to that of Swedish. Today Finland is officially bilingual in Finnish and Swedish.

Finnish alphabet (suomen aakkoset)

Finnish alphabet

Finnish pronunciation

Notes

The letters in blue are only used in names and foreign loanwords
The letter G appears in native Finnish words in combination with N as ng [ŋ]
Before unvoiced consonants, b = [p], d = [t], f = [f], g = [k] and h = [x]
c = [k] when it appears before a, o and u, and [s] when in front of e, i, y, ä and ö
Stress always falls on the first syllable of words.
Vowels and consonants can be short (written with one letter), or long (written with two letters).
Finnish has a system of vowel harmony, which means all the vowels in a word have to be of the same type. There are three types of vowels: front vowels (a, ö, y), back vowels (a, o, u) and neutral vowels (e, i). For details, see: http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Finnish:Grammar-Vowel_harmony

Information about the pronunciation of Finnish compiled by Wolfram Siegel

Sample text

Kaikki ihmiset syntyvät vapaina ja tasavertaisina arvoltaan ja oikeuksiltaan. Heille on annettu järki ja omatunto, ja heidän on toimittava toisiaan kohtaan veljeyden hengessä.

Listen to a recording of this text

Translation

All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.
(Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights)

Longer sample text (Tower of Babel)

Finnish language courses, dictionaries, etc.

Useful phrases in Finnish

Links

Finnish as a world language? (Reasons for learning Finnish)
http://www.helsinki.fi/~jshermun/language.htm

Online Finnish lessons
http://www.cs.tut.fi/~jkorpela/Finnish.html
http://virtual.finland.fi/finfo/english/finnlang.html
http://www.chiugate.be
http://donnerwetter.kielikeskus.helsinki.fi/FinnishForForeigners/

Online Finnish dictionaries
http://www.fincd.com
http://www.dictionaric.com/dicofinnois/dicofinnois.php
http://dictionary.kaannos.com

Finnish Electronic talking dictionaries
http://www.ectaco.com

Radio Suomi - online Finnish language radio
http://www.yle.fi/radiosuomi/

Helsingin Sanomat - online Finnish language newspaper
http://www.helsinginsanomat.fi/

Related languages

Erzya, Estonian, Finnish, Hungarian, Karelian, Khanty, Komi, Livonian, Mansi, Mari, Moksha, Saami, Udmurt, Võro, Votic

Other languages written with the Latin alphabet