Genetiivimuoto

Genetiivimuoto, or genitive form, is the grammatical form used to express relationships such as possession, attribution, or origin by marking a noun or pronoun. It exists in many languages, notably in Finno-Ugric languages such as Estonian and Finnish, and in various Indo-European languages. The function and morphology of the genitive vary widely. In languages with rich inflection, the genitive is a distinct case that inflects nouns, adjectives, pronouns, and numerals.

In Estonian, the genitive is called genetiiv and is a central part of noun inflection. It is primarily used to indicate possession and to link nouns in noun phrases, for example raamatu lehekülg, “the page of the book,” where raamatu is the genitive singular of raamat, and mehe auto, “the man’s car,” where mehe is the genitive of mees. The genitive is also used after numerals and with certain prepositions or verbs to express relationships.

The form varies depending on the noun’s declension class; there are predictable patterns and exceptions. In practice, learners often memorize common stems and endings and rely on context to determine the exact meaning.

Across languages, the genitive can be expressed with word order (as in English with of), with a possessive clitic or suffix (as in English ’s, German -s), or with dedicated case endings (as in Latin or Russian). The term genitive form thus encompasses a range of strategies to express similar relations.