The Finnish word for the seasons is vuodenaika. Aika means 'time', and vuoden means 'of the year'. It's the word vuosi (year) in the genitive case, and due to consonant gradation the 's' in vuosi becomes a 'd' (we're going to have to formally handle this consonant gradation issue sometime soon - it's getting unavoidable). Anyway, back to the issue at hand:
Finland, like England, has four main seasons.
kevät - spring
kesä - summer (an old word for summer is suvi - it's now also common as a girl's name)
syksy - autumn
talvi - winter
However, there are two other periods that have their own names, and are considered sort-of seasons:
kelirikko - season when frost and thaw damages the road and it becomes impossible to drive to your cottage in the forest; a few weeks between winter and spring.
ruska - the few weeks between summer and autumn when the leaves change colour.
Ruska is worth experiencing. Kelirikko isn't...
1 comment:
Thanks for the Finnish lessons!! I'm really trying to learn this beautiful and interesting language. I have a request: A lesson on "word stress" in Finnish. When I just came upon kelirikko, I wasn't sure how to accent the word in terms of stress & tone (the long & short vowels & consonants are no problem). Another lesson I would look forward to is one on Finnish culture, and how it plays into language use. Thanks so much!
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