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olla koira haudattuna. In DICTIOUS you will not only get to know all the dictionary meanings for the word
olla koira haudattuna, but we will also tell you about its etymology, its characteristics and you will know how to say
olla koira haudattuna in singular and plural. Everything you need to know about the word
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olla koira haudattuna, as well as those of other words, enriches your vocabulary and provides you with more and better linguistic resources.
Finnish
Etymology
Derived from a calque of Swedish här ligger en hund begraven, which is related to German da liegt der Hund begraben.
This idiomatic expression is almost never used in the infinitive, but also in those rare cases the verb olla means "to be" in the sense of "exist", which is normally expressed using the expression "there is" in English. Normally the Finnish expression is used in the form siinä/siihen on koira haudattuna, whose literal translation would be there is a dog buried there.
Verb
olla koira haudattuna
- (idiomatic, impersonal + illative) to smell fishy, to seem fishy, to be a catch (used when something, such as a deal, seems suspicious)
Tähän on varmasti jokin koira haudattuna.- There is surely a catch here. / This sure seems fishy.
Usage notes
Depending on the context, an appropriate English translation could also be (to) smell a rat. However, the subject of this English expression is the person noticing that something is suspicious, which must be expressed through other means in Finnish (e.g. through the elative case to express "in someone's opinion").
Conjugation
See olla; koira haudattuna is not inflected.