(A Very Brief Introduction to the Estonian Language, snippet 2)
Estonian is said to be a ātransitional form from an agglutinating to an inflected languageā, an opinion most of us would find hard to argue with, but not very helpful either. Without going into too much detail and embarrassing myself, what it essentially boils down to is that it piles dozens of different endings (usually one at a time, thank God) onto the root of the word, and, in case thatās too easy, changes the root spelling. In English, for example, a riverās a river. OK, you take on an āsā if thereās lots of them but thatās about it, although one or two verbs are, admittedly, a bit iffy, with speak, spake, spook, as Hyman Kaplan would have said, but Estonian? Itās on viagra... Take a look at this:
Nominative - jƵgi - river
Genitive - jƵe - of the/a river
Partitive - jƵge - e.g. pumping the/a river*
Illative - jƵesse - into the/a river
Inessive - jƵes - in the/a river
Elative - jƵest - from, out of the/a river
Allative - jƵele - to the/a river
Adessive - jƵel - upon, on the/a river
Ablative - jƵelt - from, off the/a river
Translative - jƵeks - for, as the/a river
Essive - jƵena - as the/a river
Terminative - jƵeni - up to, until the/a river
Abessive - jƵeta - without the/a river
Comitative - jƵega - with the/a river
* Partitive singular also used for number of things, so two rivers would be kaks jƵge... (see below)
... which raises various points: this is the singular so multiply by two; no difference between ātheā and āaā; adjectives only follow suit until the translative, after which they throw up their hands in despair and go genitive (which does actually simplify things); various forms get shortened (e.g. illative jƵesse to jƵkke, a real ink saver that one); the inessive plural probably has two forms and on-one even mentions the instructive (or the prolative), then thereās the exceptions, the maybes, the sort-ofs, and the ones that no-oneās quite sure about. Rumor has it that Estonia has a 24/7 helpline for natives worried about their declining capabilities... Anyone remember German or Latin with its pathetic little band of conjugations and declensions (der, die, das, amo, amas, amat)? Estonian has 600 of the buggers.
- A Rambling Dictionary of Tallinn Street Names, Simon Hamilton page vii













