From the 19^th century onwards, Estonian has played a significant role in literature, religion and philosophy making it a fascinating yet complex language.

Estonian and Finnish are mutually intelligible languages, which can lead to interesting false friends: the Estonian word “pulmad” would be understood as “problem” in Finnish but actually means “wedding” in Estonian; “appi” would be “mother-in-law” in Finnish but “help” in Estonian. Estonian is, however, considered more linguistically advanced as it has shortened syllables, for example where Finnish would say “huomenna”, Estonian would shorten it to “homme”.

Whereas Finnish was influenced by Swedish, Estonian was influenced by German to the extent that Estonian has borrowed nearly a third of its vocabulary from Germanic languages.

Estonian employs the Latin script but adds the letters ä, ö, ü, õ, š and ž. The role of vowels in Estonian is significant. A string of vowels can form meaningful words when used with very few consonants: for example “Jäääär” (edge of the ice), “Töö-öö” (working night) or “Puuõõnsus” (hollow of the tree).

At Geo Language Services, our translations focus on preserving its linguistic integrity while ensuring that your content resonates with Estonian speakers.