Vocab: veenma
to convince, to persuade, to assure, to make someone believe something
Building blocks
The Estonian verb "veenma" (to convince) is believed to be a verb created relatively recently. It's credited to Johannes Aavik, an Estonian linguist, in the 20th century.
He is said to have created it "out of nothing." In other words, there's no clear derivation from any other existing Estonian or foreign words. Aavik likely constructed it to fill a gap in the language for a specific concept.
How to use it
1. Convincing someone of something:
"Müüja üritas mind veenda, et see on parim tolmuimeja turul." (The salesperson tried to convince me that this is the best vacuum cleaner on the market.)
2. Assuring someone of something:
"Arst veenis patsienti, et operatsioon on ohutu." (The doctor assured the patient that the surgery is safe.)
3. Persuading someone to do something:
"Õpetaja veenis õpilasi rohkem lugema." (The teacher persuaded the students to read more.)
Things to note when using hoiatama:
Whom you convince is in the Partitive case (third base form)
What you are convincing someone of is in the Inessive case (ending -s)
Look at the examples below to see these in use ⬇️
Examples
Produtsent veenis muusikut lugu avaldama
Literally: “Producer convinced musician song to publish”
Idiomatically: “The producer convinced the musician to publish the song”
Produtsent - Noun - Nom Sg, "Producer"
veenis - Verb - 3P Past Sg, "convinced"
muusikut - Noun - Partitive Sg, "musician"
lugu - Noun - Nom Sg, "song"
avaldama - Verb - ma-Infinitive, "to publish"Enne ülekäigurajale astumist veendusin selle ohutuses
Literally: “Before crosswalk-onto stepping, I made sure it’s safety-in”
Idiomatically: “Before stepping onto the crosswalk, I made sure it was safe”
Enne - Adverb - Indeclineable, "Before"
ülekäigurajale - Noun - Allative Sg, "crosswalk-onto"
astumist - Noun - Partitive Sg, "stepping"
veendusin - Verb - 1P Past Sg, "I made sure"
selle - Pronoun - Genitive Sg, "it's"
ohutuses - Noun - Inessive Sg, "safety-in"