Kenttinä

Kenttinä is a Finnish word-form, the essive plural of the noun kenttä, which means "field", "ground", "pitch" or "site" (including agricultural fields, sports fields and military grounds). As an essive case form, kenttinä expresses a temporary state, role or likeness and is commonly translated into English as "as fields", "in the form of fields" or "serving as fields".

In Finnish grammar the essive plural is used to indicate that something functions or is regarded in the capacity of multiple fields: for example, Niitä käytettiin kenttinä harjoituksissa ("They were used as fields in the exercises") or Aukiot toimivat kenttinä juhlien aikana ("The squares served as fields during the festivities"). Pronunciation approximates to KEN-tih-nah, with primary stress on the first syllable.

Kenttinä arises by applying the essive plural inflection to kenttä; the base noun kenttä is found across contexts including agriculture, sport and military vocabulary. The essive case itself is an important part of Finnish case morphology, used to mark temporary states, roles, occasions and comparisons. Kenttinä therefore appears in descriptive, functional and metaphorical usages where multiple areas are characterized or used as fields. Related forms include kenttä (nominative), kentän (genitive), kenttänä (essive singular) and kentät (plural nominative).