Editing Partitive case (section)

== Finnic languages ==

In [[Finnic languages]], such as [[Finnish language|Finnish]] and [[Estonian language|Estonian]], this case is often used to express unknown identities and [[Telicity#Telicity as an aspect|irresultative]] actions. For example, in Finnish, it is found in the following circumstances, with the characteristic ending of ''-a'' or ''-ta'':

* After numbers, in singular: "kolme talo'''a'''" → "three                                            houses" (cf. plural, where both are used, e.g. ''sadat kirjat'' "the hundreds of books", ''sata kirjaa'' "hundred books" as an irresultative object.)
* For [[Telicity|atelic]] actions (possibly incomplete) and ongoing processes: "luen kirja'''a'''" → "I'm reading a book"
** Compare with [[Telicity|telic]] actions in accusative case: "luen kirja'''n'''" → "I will read the (entire) book"
* With atelic verbs, particularly those indicating emotions: "rakastan tä'''tä''' talo'''a'''" → "I love this house"
* For tentative inquiries: "saanko lainata kirja'''a'''?" → "can I borrow the book?"
* For uncountables: "lasissa on maito'''a'''" → "there is (some) milk in the glass"
* Compositions: "pala juusto'''a'''" → "a piece of cheese"
* In places where English would use "some" or "any": "onko teillä kirjo'''ja'''?" → "do you have any books?"
** Compare with nominative case: "onko teillä kirj'''at'''?" → "do you have the (specific) books?"
* For negative statements: "talossa ei ole kirja'''a'''" → "in the house, [there] is not [a] book"
* Comparisons
** Without "kuin" ("than"): "saami'''sta''' parempa'''a''' on antaminen" → "what is better than receiving is giving"
** The more common form "antaminen on parempaa kuin saaminen" "giving is better than receiving" places only the comparative adverb in the partitive.

Where not mentioned, the accusative case would be ungrammatical. For example, the partitive must always be used after singular numerals.

As an example of the irresultative meaning of the partitive, ''ammuin karhun'' ([[accusative case|accusative]]) means "I shot the bear (dead)", whereas ''ammuin karhua'' (partitive) means "I shot (at) the bear" without specifying if it was even hit. Notice that Finnish has no native [[future tense]], so that the partitive provides an important reference to the present as opposed to the future. Thus ''luen kirjaa'' means "I am reading a/the book" whereas ''luen kirjan'' means "I will read a/the book". Thus "luen" can mean "I read", "I am reading" or "I will read" depending on the case form of the word that follows.  The partitive form ''kirjaa'' indicates incompleted action and hence the meaning of the verb form is present tense.  The accusative form ''kirjan'' indicates completed action when used with the past tense verb but indicates planned future action when used with a verb in the present tense. Hence ''luen kirjan'' means "I will read the book".
 
The case with an unspecified identity is ''onko teillä kirjoja'', which uses the partitive, because it refers to unspecified books, as contrasted to [[Nominative case|nominative]] ''onko teillä (ne) kirjat?'', which means "do you have (those) books?"

The partitive case comes from the older [[ablative case]]. This meaning is preserved e.g. in ''kotoa'' (from home), ''takaa'' (from behind), where it means "from".

A Western Finnish dialectal phenomenon seen in some dialects is the assimilation of the final ''-a'' into a preceding vowel, thus making the [[chroneme]] the partitive marker. For example, ''suurii'' → ''suuria'' "some big --".

In Estonian, the system is generally similar. In Estonian grammatical tradition, the term "accusative" is not used, since like in Finnish, the total object form coincides with the genitive in the singular, and the nominative in the plural.

In many Estonian words, the difference between the full and partial object cases is only in vowel or consonant quantity (long vs overlong), which is not marked in writing, except for stop consonants. Thus, the distinction between a total and partial object may be apparent in speech but not in writing. For example, the sentence ''Linn ehitab kooli'' would mean "The city will build a/the school" when pronounced with a long vowel "o" in ''kooli'' "school (genitive case)", and "The city is building a/the school" with an overlong "o" (partitive case).

For many verbs in Estonian, an additional adverb is almost always added when a completed action is meant - for example, ''ma söön leiba'' "I'm eating bread", vs ''ma söön leiva '''ära''''' "I will eat the (whole) bread". Since Estonian, unlike Finnish, has words where the genitive and partitive singular are identical even in pronunciation, this can provide disambiguation in those cases - e.g ''ma söön kala'' "I'm eating fish", vs ''ma söön kala ära'' "I will eat (all of) the fish".