Finnish

Pronoun

kuka

1. (interrogative) who; (when followed by a modifier in elative case, -sta/-stä) which one (of + a noun referring to people).
2. (indefinite) whoever.
3. (relative) who, when the pronoun refers to the whole of the preceding sentence. ^[1]

   En tiedä, kuka sen teki.

   I don't know who did it.

   but:

   Tässä on mies, joka sen teki.

   This is the man who did it.

4. (relative, dialectal) who

Synonyms

• (who): ken ( the nominative singular is archaic, see "Inflection" section below)
• (whoever): kuka tahansa, ken

Inflection

• Modern inflections of kuka are based around the stem form ke- or kene-.
• The modern adessive, ablative and allative singular cases have alternative forms of equal value. Thus kenellä, keneltä, kenelle can equally be expressed as kellä, keltä, kelle.
• Following the pattern of other personal pronouns the accusative form is kenet. (compare minut, sinut, etc.)

Forms of the word based on a stem form of ku- have become old fashioned and somewhat poetic even though the nominative singular kuka remains modern. The nominative form ken is found only in archaic or poetic language.

Thus, “Kuta sinä rakastat?” could be translated as “Whom dost thou love?”

Some cases of kuka/ken are hardly used. The inflection table below shows the archaic or otherwise disappeared/disappearing forms in brackets.

The instructive plural kuin with the stem -ka*, the lative singular kun* and and the causative singular kuten* (also as the dated, archaic form: kutenka*) are used as adverbs with completely different meanings from “who”.

Note: In the inflection table below, poetic and/or archaic forms are shown in brackets and modern usage without brackets. See also the declension of the negative form ei kukaan.

Usage notes

• The singular forms are sometimes used colloquially instead of the actual plural forms. Ketä is particularly common for keitä. In some dialects ketä is used in place of kuka.

Related terms

See also

• Kukapa tietää?

References

1. ↑ http://kaino.kotus.fi/visk/sisallys.php?p=735

Anagrams

• akku

Hungarian

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): [ˈ****ɒ]
• Hyphenation: ku‧ka

Etymology 1

Origin uncertain; perhaps an Italian loan word, compare Northern Italian cuco ‎(“goofy”).

Adjective

kuka

1. dumb (as a fish), tongue-tied (not saying a word)

Etymology 2

Via Czech, from German KUKA, short for Keller und Knappich Augsburg, a German firm which was manufacturing and supplying orange refuse collection vehicles. Today the company KUKA is producing industrial robots and automation technologies.

Noun

kuka ‎(plural ****ák)

1. garbage can, refuse bin

Declension

Pitjantjatjara

Noun

kuka

1. animal
2. meat

Quechua

Noun

kuka

1. coca

Declension

Serbo-Croatian

Etymology

From Proto-Slavic *kuka ‎(“hook, hook-shaped”). Akin to kȕk.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /kûka/
• Hyphenation: ku‧ka

Noun

kȕka f ‎(Cyrillic spelling ку̏ка)

1. hook

Declension

References

• “kuka” in Hrvatski jezični portal