ravistimme

Ravistimme is the first-person plural imperfect form of the Finnish verb ravistaa, which means to shake, jar, or shake off. The form is used to describe a completed action in the past carried out by the speaker together with others. Ravistaa is primarily transitive, taking a direct object such as a rug, a cloth, or dust, though it can also appear in idiomatic expressions related to shaking or jolting.

As a past tense form, ravistimme appears in sentences like “Me ravistimme mattoa, jotta pöly putosi,” meaning “We shook the rug to make the dust fall.” The function of the form is to indicate that the shaking action was performed by the subject(s) in the past. The verb has corresponding forms for other persons and tenses, such as ravistan (I shake, present), ravistat (you shake, present), ravisti (he/she shook), and ravistimme (we shook, present), among others.

Morphology and usage notes: Ravistaa is a common, everyday Finnish verb. Ravistimme, like other -imme forms, marks plural subject and past tense. In everyday speech, ravistaa is used for physical actions (shaking a object, like a rug or a hand) and can appear in concrete or figurative senses (to shake off fear or worry, although the literal sense is more common). The noun forms associated with the action include ravistus (a shake, tremor) and ravistus or ravistelu (the act of shaking).

See also: ravistus, ravistelu, ravistaa.