Appendix:Historical Finnish spelling

The written Finnish language is usually divided into multiple periods: Old Literary Finnish (vanha kirjasuomi, from the earliest writing in the 1540s until 1810 or 1820), Early Modern Finnish (varhaisnykysuomi, until the 1870s-1880s) and Modern Finnish (since then). The language norms, including spelling, have changed at times dramatically during these time periods.

This page describes examples of differences between Finnish spelling in these time periods and modern Finnish spelling. In general, any point that applies to later time periods also applies to earlier ones.

• The spelling was not nearly as consistent as during the later periods. In particular, any spellings from before the 1642 Bible translation (Biblia: Se on: Coco Pyhä Ramattu Suomexi) were often wildly inconsistent.
  • The vowels ⟨ä⟩ and ⟨e⟩ were not spelled consistently. It was quite common to spell an ⟨ä⟩ with an ⟨e⟩ (or at times even ⟨ae⟩), and to a lesser extent also vice versa. In later syllables ⟨ä⟩ could also simply become ⟨a⟩.

    sine → sinä       henen → hänen       haen → hän       käsekw → kesäkuu

  • The vowel ⟨i⟩ could be spelled ⟨j⟩ and was generally spelled ⟨y⟩ in diphthongs.

    jhme → ihme       toysella → toisella

  • The vowel ⟨o⟩ could be spelled ⟨å⟩ or, in some cases when unstressed, ⟨u⟩.

    nåuse → nousee       iouckuhon → joukko(h)on

  • The vowel ⟨y⟩ could be spelled ⟨i⟩, ⟨ij⟩, (the following three especially in later syllables) ⟨u⟩, ⟨w⟩ or ⟨ö⟩.

    ijxi → yksi       hywuwdens → hyvyytensä

  • The vowel ⟨ö⟩ could be spelled ⟨o⟩ in later syllables or ⟨e⟩ in diphthongs. On the other hand, the now-diphthong ⟨yö⟩ was often spelled ⟨öö⟩ or ⟨öe⟩.

    öelle → yöllä       töet → työt

  • Vowel length was not marked consistently, if at all (for instance, it was rarely marked in later syllables). Long ⟨i⟩ was relatively consistently spelled {{orth|ij}, however}. Consonant length was sometimes marked, other times not.

    söket → syökäät       nijn → niin       taiualista → taivaallista

  • The consonant ⟨v⟩ was generally spelled ⟨u⟩ or even ⟨w⟩ or ⟨fw⟩. The vowel ⟨u⟩ could be spelled ⟨v⟩ or ⟨w⟩.

    vlgosannetan → ulosannetaan       käsekw → kesäkuu       leiuen → leivän

  • The plosives ⟨k⟩, ⟨p⟩, ⟨t⟩ was spelled as voiced (⟨g⟩, ⟨b⟩, ⟨d⟩ respectively) after a nasal or liquid.

    kuinga → kuinka       lambat → lampaat       kulda → kulta

  • The consonant ⟨k⟩ (if not affected by the previous point) was often spelled ⟨c⟩ in certain environments. Specifically, ⟨c⟩ was used before back vowels and ⟨k⟩ before front vowels. Before 1642, it could even be spelled ⟨q⟩ prior to a -u-. A geminated ⟨k⟩, if expressed, was ⟨ck⟩.

    ioca → joka       quin → kuin

  • The consonant ⟨j⟩ was often spelled ⟨i⟩, but its inconsistent spelling meant it could also appear as e.g. ⟨y⟩.

    ia → ja       söyan → syöjän

  • The consonant ⟨s⟩ could be spelled ⟨sz⟩, or (especially after a nasal or liquid) ⟨ss⟩.

    anssion → ansion

  • The consonant ⟨t⟩ was sometimes ⟨d⟩, ⟨dh⟩ or ⟨dt⟩ at the end of words, or ⟨th⟩ in the middle of words.

    töödh → työt

  • ⟨ks⟩ was almost invariably spelled ⟨x⟩.

    muistoxi → muistoksi

• The main literary norm was Southwestern Finnish.
  • The inessive ending (modern standard -ssa, -ssä) was often simply -s.
  • Vowels followed by a (morphological) -n in the same syllable might become nasalized, which would often be written with a tilde.
  • ⟨ts⟩ (< Proto-Finnic *-cc-), which in Southwestern Finnish was still a dental fricative /θ/, was generally spelled ⟨tz⟩.

    itze /iθːe/ → itse

  • ⟨d⟩ (/ð/ in Southwestern Finnish) could be spelled variously as ⟨d⟩, ⟨dh⟩ or rarely even according to other dialectal forms. ⟨d⟩ eventually became the early standard in the 1642 Bible translation.

    modholla /mo̞ːðolːɑ/ → muodolla       teudes /tæy̯ðes/ → täydes(sä)

  • The combination ⟨hd⟩ was not consistently separated from the above.

    tadhon → tahdon       cadexen → kahdeksan

  • The weak grade of ⟨k⟩ (/ɣ/ in Southwestern Finnish) could appear as ⟨g⟩, ⟨gh⟩, or sometimes ⟨ghi⟩ when followed by a front vowel or ⟨ghw⟩ when followed by a labial vowel.

    vlgos /ulɣos/ → ulos       lughun /luɣun/ → luvun       nelghien /nælɣæn/ → nälän       aighwonut /ɑi̯ɣonut/ → aikonut       welghisteni /ʋelɣistæni/ → veljistäni

  • The consonant ⟨h⟩, when /x/, could be spelled ⟨ch⟩ or even ⟨c⟩.

    tapachtui /tɑpɑxtui̯/ → tapahtui

• Capitalization in Old Literary Finnish was used more liberally than today, probably after German influence.
• Until the early 19th century or so, ⟨ä⟩ and ⟨ö⟩ were spelled in their older forms, with an e above the letter: aͤ, oͤ.

By the 1642 Bible translation, many inconsistencies had been addressed, yet others remained. ⟨k⟩ was still generally spelled ⟨c⟩ or ⟨k⟩ depending on the following vowel, the spelling of the -ts- in e.g. metsä was inconsistent between ⟨tz⟩ and ⟨dz⟩, although the former began to gain ground in the early 18th century. Vowel length was still not often marked in later syllables, although the long vowels at the end of illative forms specifically were often spelled as such.

By the 1776 Bible translation, ⟨c⟩ had fallen out of use. By the end of the period, ⟨x⟩ also fell out of use and was replaced by modern ⟨ks⟩, ⟨tz⟩ was replaced by modern ⟨ts⟩ and plosives began to be written as unvoiced after liquids and nasals. As the norm shifted increasingly to Tavastian and later to a more mixed-dialect form, and as the sound was lost from the southweatern dialects as well, ⟨g⟩/⟨gh⟩ (/ɣ/) disappeared.

See also: Appendix:Historical Finnish spelling/Mark 1:1-8

From the front page of the first Finnish primer (and the first known Finnish-language book ever), Abckiria (1543) by Mikael Agricola, comes this famous poem (two options are given for the last three columns, see notes):

Notes for the above:

The Ten Commandments from Abckiria (1543):

• In the 19th century, it was still common for speakers to spell according to their own norms. A well-known example is Carl Axel Gottlund, who wrote in a language based on the Savonian dialects, which he championed as the basis for Standard Finnish. In the end, however, Standard Finnish converged towards a form that resembles the Tavastian dialects the most.
• Prior to the 20th century, the letter ⟨V⟩ was usually spelled as ⟨W⟩, as Finnish was mostly printed in blackletter fonts (particularly fraktur). It was not uncommon in 19th-century sources to distinguish Finnish text from text in other languages by typesetting the Finnish in fraktur or blackletter and the other language in Roman type or antiqua. For example, 19th-century Finnish-Swedish dictionaries typeset Finnish in blackletter and Swedish in Roman type. The first texts to make the transition to Roman type were academic texts in the mid-19th century (although Roman type was also used sporadically before then), but popular texts often took until the 20th century; the first Bible in Roman type was published in 1912, and some newspapers only made the transition in the 1940s. Long s also largely fell out of use concurrently with the transition from blackletter to Roman type.

  wuori → vuori       ſinun → sinun

• The modern norm regarding -oitta- and -otta- in verbs had not yet become standardized. It would take until the 1950s for these to finally become fully standardized.

  kehoittaa → kehottaa       kirjottaa → kirjoittaa

• -j- was not consistently spelled when preceded by a -i- (e.g. in sija and many -ja nouns).

  tekiä → tekijä       sia → sija

• -i- in diphthongs in later syllables was standardized only later, e.g. that -inen is for adjectives and -nen for diminutives.

  hevoinen → hevonen       punanen → punainen

• Many conjunctions with kuin were still written as one word.

  niinkuin → niin kuin       ennenkuin → ennen kuin

• Katsaus vanhan kirjasuomen ortografiaan (in Finnish)
• Suomen oikeinkirjoitus 1500-luvulla (in Finnish)