baltics – a Polyglot illustrating Scandinavia

24th February is Estonian Independence Day! To celebrate, here is some info on one of the closest relatives of Finnish and insight on Uralic languages.

Finnish and Estonian are both Uralic languages, belonging to a different family than most languages spoken in Europe, from Icelandic to Italian, which are all Indo-European languages. Find out more about Finnish compared to other Nordic languages. I already wrote in Estonian culture in general compared to Finland after my trip to the Baltics last summer.

Finnish and Estonian: Finnic sister languages

Estonian is the second biggest Finnic language after Finnish , spoken by around 1 million people, (Finnish has 5 millions). Other related languages exist in the Baltics, although most have very few speakers left: võro, Livonian (in Latvia).

There are many similarities exist betwenn Finnish and Estonian. Although they are not always mututally intelligible, Finns and Estonians can often understand each other, particularly in written form. Estonians in particular used to be able to understand Finnish very well thanks to access to Finnish media they had access to during the Soviet occupation.

Unique Finnic language features

Gender-neutral pronoun: The English third person pronoun has a gender distinction – he/she. Finnish and Estonian have only one, neutral version: “hän” in Finnish and “ta” in Estonian.
Vowel Length (2 in Finnish, 3 in Estonian): Both Finnish and Estonian have short and long vowels: you often see double ones when bumping into these languages – aa, ää , ee, oo, ii etc. For example: mutta ‘but’ vs muuttaa ‘to change’ in Finnish.
Estonian, has however not two, but three vowel lengths: kala (fish) Long: kaala (weigh), kaalla (with a neck).
14-15 inflections of grammatical cases (simplified in Estonian): Both languages often convey meaning through inflection: I go to Estonia – Tulen estii Finnish stayed more conservative, while Estonian started using more prepositions instead and dropped the accusative case.

Finnish and Estonian vocabulary

There is a large Finnic common vocabulary: the following words are the same in Finnish and Estonian, unrelated to indoeuropean languages:

water: vesi
moon: kuu
money: raha
tree: puu
snow: lumi
hand: käsi
expensive: kallis
sea: meri

Countries around Finnic people got similar, distinct names in their languages, notice the following: Finland, Sweden, Germany, Russia, Denmark:

Finnish: Suomi, Ruotsi, Saksa, Venäjä, Tanska
Estonian: Soome, Rootsi, Saksamaa, Venemaa, Taani. Maa means ‘Land’ also in Finnish

Finnish got many loanwords from Sweden, being its neighbor and ruling power. Similarly, Estonian has borrowed as much from German. As a common Finnic feature, many words which originally had S with another consonant after it, dropped the S.

	Finnish	Estonian	Swedish	German
school	koulu	kool	skola	Schule
chair	tuoli	tool	stol	Stuhl
to paint	maalata	maalima	måla	malen
ham	kinkku	sink	skinka	Schinken
cake	kakku	kook	kaka	Kuchen
kitchen	keittiö	köök	köket	Küche
mirror	peili	pegeli	spegel	Spiegel

Tell Finnish and Estonian apart

Estonian and Finnish look similar, so if you’re not familar with any you can tell if it is Estonian instead for these features:

Estonian has the unique letter Õ, and – unlike Finnish – uses Ü, B and G in native Finnic words (Finnish only in foreign words). Š and Ž can also be rarely seen in words of foreign origin in Estonian, although not officially part of the alphabet
diphthongs not present in Finnish: if you see two different vowels next to each other, that cannot be Finnish – but if it looks like it, it might be Estonian: päev.
No vowel harmony in Estonian: In Finnish, words contain vowels from only front or back vowels – so ä, y, ö cannot be together in the same word with a, u, o. In Estonian, mixing them is possible.

Spoken Estonian tends to sound softer and more fluid, while Finnish pronunciation is more rythmic. This might be due to dipthongs and consonant length distinction in pronunciation, stricter in Finnish, where the difference between short and long consonants is stronger.

Finnish and Estonian language days

Both countries have a day dedicated to their respective languages.

Estonian language day, also Mother Tongue day, Emakeelepäev, is celebrated on 14th March since 1999, birthday of the poet Kristjan Jaak Peterson. Poetry readings including a 12-hours reading marathon mark the day.

Finnish language day is on 9th April in honour of Michael Agricola, a 1500s clergyman considered the father of written Finnish for having published the first book in this language.

sources

suomainen.com
elang.ee – Estonian vs Finnish
Langfocus
news.err.ee – How German shaped the Estonian language

An introduction to Estonian: sister language of Finnish

Estonian is a Finnic language, sharing many similarities with its ‘bigger’ sister Finnish, while being unrelated to all their bigger language neighbours

by Chiara 24 February 202624 February 2026

Scandinavian carnival buns (and where to eat them in the Netherlands)

Cream buns are enjoyed in Nordic and Baltic countries during shrovetide, between January and February. Sweden’s classic semla has almond paste, while other countries variations include jam, vanilla cream, and chocolate icing top.

by Chiara 17 February 202619 February 2026

5 symbols of Sami culture

Sámi people, indigenous people of North Scandinavia, have a distinct culture, symbolised by its unique flag and traditional clothing, and part of it are Duodji handicrafts and unique musical expression through yoik.

by Chiara 6 February 20265 February 2026

Last summer i visited Latvia and Estonia. They are not too far from Scandinavia, and I was curious to find what they have in common with Nordics.

1. language and identity in the Baltics

While Latvians and Lithuanians are Baltic people – speaking an Indo-European language, related to Slavic languages- Estonians are Finnic, and their language is very close to Finnish, making Estonia the most ‘Nordic’ of the Baltic countries. Livonians are a small Finnic minority in Latvia.
Estonia in particular has deep ties with Scandinavia – it used to be under Swedish and Danish rule. Though you can find a Swedish gate in Riga too!

There is actually a Swedish minority in Northern Estonia and coastal areas, that has existed since the 13th Century: eestirootslased or rannarootslased in Estonian, estlandssvenskar or aibofolket in Swedish, similarly to Finlandssvenskar, Finland’s Swedes.
Its number shrinked however significantly due to the USSR occupation in the 20th century, that urged many to flee to Sweden, being very small today.

There is also significant proficiency in Finnish in Estonia, thanks to its linguistic proximity with Estonian and exposure to Finnish broadcasts during the Soviet era. Nowadays, young Estonians are not as exposed to Finnish media as older generations were during those times, and Finnish is not as intelligible for them as it used to be for their parents.

According to a poll done in 2013, about half of the young Estonians considered themselves Nordic, and about the same number viewed Baltic identity as important.

2. Baltic cuisine

Rye bread is king! As dark as night! Rye bread chocolate is a things both countries!! Says enough..
Herring, Redbeet, (potato) pancakes are staples – all stuff to be found at LIDO chain self-service restaurants, Latvian of origin.
Soups in Latvia are a very common part of meals as in Slavic countries, notably the redbeet cold soup. Something typical Latvian are the dumplings Pelmeni, similar to Polish Pierogi etc.
A galore of Baked goods were everywhere in Latvia, maybe not as much in Estonia. Nordic style buns were in both! Something that seemed very common were custard buns, and coconut coated buns. Latvians seem to love cookies.

Kalev is Estonia’s chocolate brand, Latvia also has its national confectionery brand Laci.

3. Nordic stores and products in Baltic

Stockmann department stores are present in both countries – you can find a lot of Nordic stuff, including Norwegian Brunost and carelian pastries!! Though I saw carelian pastries in Estonian supermarkets, and ICA cloudberry and lingon jam at a Rimi supermarket.. Finnish fast food chain Hesburger is present in the Baltics – I have to say I did not see any special items from it though…
You can get bulk candy in supermarkets like in Nordics. But it seems in the Baltics they enjoy bulk cookies as well!

Finnish brands as Fazer chocolate and some moomin stuff is common in Estonia. At Tallinn airport they had a whole selection of more Finnish and Swedish candy brands, and even a Pippi + moomin merch corner!!

4. architecture

Looking at some buildings, you could be in Scandinavia, though others make you think of Eastern European cottages.

Old buildings in the centre of Riga and Tallinn. I think these could be mistaken for Danish or from Stockholm?

Countryside houses in Jūrmala and in Estonia. I guess these look more like Eastern European cottages. Birch trees give a pretty Nordic vibe though.

Orthodox churches in Jūrmala and Tallinn

Folk Culture

As in Sweden and Finland among others, Baltic celebrate the Summer Solstice, a.k.a. Midsummer – or Saint John’s night – jääni in Estonian, Jāņi in Latvia. People go to the countryside to gather and eat, drink, sing and take part to old pagan traditions. Among others lighting a bonfire and gather herbs to make flower crowns and oak leaves wreaths!