Estonian eesti keel
Spoken in	Estonia
Number of speakers	1.1 million
Typology	SVO
Classification by family
- Uralic languages - Finno-Ugric - Finno-Permian (fr) - Finno-volgaques - Finno-Sami - Finnic languages - Estonian
Official status
Official language of	Estonia , European Union
Language codes
ISO 639-1	and
ISO 639-2	is
ISO 639-3	is
IETF	and
Sample
Article I of the Declaration of Human Rights ( see text in French ) Artikkel 1. Koike inimesed snnivad vabadena vrdsetena ja ja oma vrikuselt igustelt. Neile is antud mistus ja ja sdametunnistus Nende suhtumist ksteisesse Peab kandma vendluse Vaima.
change

The Estonian is a language belonging to the Finnic branch of the family of Uralic languages. It is closely related to Finnish and more distantly to Hungarian. It is spoken by approximately 1.1 million people, the vast majority (950 000) living in Estonia.

Phonology, alphabet, pronunciation

On the phonological, Estonian is characterized by the existence of three periods vowel and consonant : Most phonemes can be short, long or sirloin. This presentation of facts has nevertheless been questioned in the 1990s. Rather than describing the duration of phonemes, many linguists prefer now describe the three "times" syllabic (or groups of two syllables) and reduce the ternary system to a traditional fitting of two binary oppositions: the syllables accented can be long and short and long syllables may be an "accent" strong or weak, the term "accent" here denoting a set of features mainly prosodic including energy articulation, intonation curve and the relative length of the stressed syllable and the next syllable.

The accent is on the first syllable of words, except in the relatively recent loanwords, where he was often kept at the place he had in the original language.

The alphabet, Estonian is the Latin alphabet up some signs diacritics : , , refer to phonemes similar to those spellings in German; note Grammar

Typologically , Estonian is a transitional form between language agglutinative and inflected language. He has suffered during its history a strong influence of German in its vocabulary as in its syntax. For example, he developed a system of verbs with particles whose shape and function to recall the verbs separable particles of German.

Estonian has no articles and do not know the grammatical gender. The variation comprises 14 cases : nominative , genitive , partitive , illative , inessive , elation , allative , Adessi , ablative , translative , terminative , Essifi , abbess and comitative.

A special feature of this system is the casual absence of accusative , the direct object can be marked, depending on the context, for the nominative, genitive or partitive.

The attributive adjective agrees in case and number with the noun it determines, except it is completed Essifi, the Abbess and committees where there is no agreement in the event (the The adjective is then the genitive).

Table of cases

The verbal system is characterized by the absence of future (we use this) and the existence of special forms to express the action performed by someone known (the equivalent of "on" French) and reported speech (user specific verbal called oblique mode "or" mediative ). There are at least two infinitives: the first, ending with the suffix-ma, is the form that appears in dictionaries and is used eg after verbs meaning "duty" or "start". The second infinitive, especially in finished-da or-ta (but also in it, or-na-ra), for example, used after verbs meaning "may", "will", "love." Some grammars regard it as an infinitive form the specific en-wat (corresponding to mediative present) when used after a verb of appearance (meaning "appear").

History

The first word of a known transcription Estonian perhaps dates back to the ^eighth century : in his cosmography, Aethicus Ister mentions an island named Taraconta (Tharaconta). Some authors suggest that perhaps meant by that Estonia or its largest island, Saaremaa. Taraconta can indeed be interpreted as Taara + kond. Taara was, according to some, one of the major gods of ancient Estonians and the suffix-kond will refer to a community of people, as in the word perekond "family" or a territorial entity, as in maakond "province". Taraconta could well describe the Estonians as worshipers Taara.

From the ^thirteenth century , written sources more abundant can have a clearer idea of the state of language development. It was at this time that German and Scandinavian crusaders reached Estonia, who was one of the last pagan lands of Europe. The Crusades against the Estonians have been described during the first half of the ^thirteenth century in the Latin chronicle Heinrici Livoniae Chronicon (Chronicle of Henry the Latvian), which contains words and sentence fragments in Estonian.

Many proper names and place names are also attested Estonia from the ^thirteenth century. A role of Danish tax (Liber Census Daniae), established between 1219 and 1220 , includes about 500 names of northern Estonia.

Following the Crusades , a nobility and bourgeoisie German settled on the territory of the former Livonia , covering Estonia and Latvia today. Although Estonia has changed masters several times over seven centuries of foreign occupation ( Denmark , Poland , Sweden , Russia ), Estonian was mainly influenced by Low German and High German , as well as the German dialect of the Baltic which developed from them. In particular, the vocabulary of the modern city and draws heavily from the German.

The first text is the Estonian kept Kullamaa manuscript, which dates from the years 1524 -1528. This is a translation of the main Catholic prayers (Our Father, Hail Mary "and" I believe in God "). When the Reformation came to Estonia, preaching in the vernacular made necessary the translation of religious texts in Estonian and Estonian north to the south.

The first grammars and dictionaries were first written in the ^seventeenth century. It has since then a large number of texts preserved.

During the National Revival that occurred in the mid- ^nineteenth century , Estonian, who was formerly the language of peasants, quickly became a language of culture, particularly through the University of Tartu , one of the main foci intellectuals. He began to be used in literature and science. At the same time the first studies were published in Estonian language. In 1884, Karl August Hermann brought out the first Estonian grammar in Estonian, which contributed significantly to the standardization of the language.

In the second half of the ^nineteenth century , the indigenous population began to designate under the name eesti, probably borrowed two centuries earlier in Swedish or the German. Previously, the majority of Estonians called themselves as the maarahvas "locals" and called their language maakeel "the language of the country."

During the first decades of the ^twentieth century , intellectuals gave Estonian mission is to develop their language to suit modern European culture. An important role in this process was played by the linguist (and a French teacher) Aavik Johannes , who tried to enrich and embellish the literary language. He used plenty of resources provided by the Finnish and dialects, but also created words and grammatical morphemes artificial. The French inspired many of his proposals. Alongside this "renovation language" (keeleuuendus) Aavik launched by another current, led by Johannes Voldemar Veski , focused on the development of standards and terminology development. Several thousand words in all fields of knowledge and life were created during this period. During the ^twentieth century , a key role in setting the standard language was played by normative dictionaries. The first of them appeared in 1918.

During the regime Soviet (1940-1991), the standardization of language and strict compliance became a form of national resistance. It was a way to oppose the Soviet ideology, symbolized by the language Russian. Language was one of the fundamental constituents of the Estonian identity. The authorities had also banned or scientific study of Estonian or her employment in most areas of public life (including education), which allowed the Estonians and their language to resist the Russification and colonization. In the 1990s, attitudes towards the standard language have eased. The sociolects and other non-standard language varieties came back in the spotlight.

On ¹ May 2004 , Estonian became one of the twenty official languages of the European Union.

Examples

Some common words

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