Serbo-Croatian Grammar
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

Serbo-Croatian Serbo-Croatian ( / ), also known as Bosnian-Croatian-Montenegrin-Serbian (BCMS), is a South Slavic language and the primary language of Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Montenegro. It is a pluricentric language with four mutually i ...
is a South Slavic language that, like most other
Slavic languages The Slavic languages, also known as the Slavonic languages, are Indo-European languages spoken primarily by the Slavs, Slavic peoples and their descendants. They are thought to descend from a proto-language called Proto-Slavic language, Proto- ...
, has an extensive system of
inflection In linguistic Morphology (linguistics), morphology, inflection (less commonly, inflexion) is a process of word formation in which a word is modified to express different grammatical category, grammatical categories such as grammatical tense, ...
. This article describes exclusively the grammar of the Shtokavian dialect, which is a part of the South Slavic dialect continuum and the basis for the Bosnian, Croatian, Montenegrin, and Serbian standard variants of Serbo-Croatian. "An examination of all the major 'levels' of language shows that BCS is clearly a single language with a single grammatical system." Pronouns, nouns, adjectives and some numerals decline (change the word ending to reflect case, the grammatical category and function) whereas verbs conjugate for person and tense. As in other Slavic languages, the basic word order is subject–verb–object (SVO), but the declensions show sentence structure and so word order is not as important as in more analytic languages, such as English or Chinese. Deviations from the standard SVO order are stylistically marked and may be employed to convey a particular emphasis, mood or overall tone, according to the intentions of the speaker or writer. Often, such deviations will sound literary, poetical or archaic. Nouns have three
grammatical gender In linguistics, a grammatical gender system is a specific form of a noun class system, where nouns are assigned to gender categories that are often not related to the real-world qualities of the entities denoted by those nouns. In languages wit ...
s (masculine, feminine and neuter) that correspond, to a certain extent, with the word ending. Accordingly, most nouns with -a are feminine, -o and -e neuter, and the rest mostly masculine but with some feminine. The grammatical gender of a noun affects the morphology of other parts of speech (adjectives, pronouns, and verbs) attached to it. Nouns are declined into seven cases:
nominative In grammar, the nominative case ( abbreviated ), subjective case, straight case, or upright case is one of the grammatical cases of a noun or other part of speech, which generally marks the subject of a verb, or (in Latin and formal variants of E ...
,
genitive In grammar, the genitive case ( abbreviated ) is the grammatical case that marks a word, usually a noun, as modifying another word, also usually a noun—thus indicating an attributive relationship of one noun to the other noun. A genitive can ...
,
dative In grammar, the dative case (abbreviated , or sometimes when it is a core argument) is a grammatical case used in some languages to indicate the recipient or beneficiary of an action, as in "", Latin for "Maria gave Jacob a drink". In this exampl ...
,
accusative In grammar, the accusative case (abbreviated ) of a noun is the grammatical case used to receive the direct object of a transitive verb. In the English language, the only words that occur in the accusative case are pronouns: "me", "him", "her", " ...
,
vocative In grammar, the vocative case (abbreviated ) is a grammatical case which is used for a noun that identifies a person (animal, object, etc.) being addressed or occasionally for the noun modifiers (determiners, adjectives, participles, and numeral ...
,
locative In grammar, the locative case ( ; abbreviated ) is a grammatical case which indicates a location. In languages using it, the locative case may perform a function which in English would be expressed with such prepositions as "in", "on", "at", and " ...
, and
instrumental An instrumental or instrumental song is music without any vocals, although it might include some inarticulate vocals, such as shouted backup vocals in a big band setting. Through Semantic change, semantic widening, a broader sense of the word s ...
, albeit with considerable
syncretism Syncretism () is the practice of combining different beliefs and various school of thought, schools of thought. Syncretism involves the merging or religious assimilation, assimilation of several originally discrete traditions, especially in the ...
(overlap) especially in the plural. Verbs are divided into two broad classes according to their aspect, which can be either '' perfective'' (signifying a completed action) or ''
imperfective The imperfective (abbreviated , , or more ambiguously ) is a grammatical aspect used to describe ongoing, habitual, repeated, or similar semantic roles, whether that situation occurs in the past, present, or future. Although many languages have a ...
'' (action is incomplete or repetitive). There are seven tenses, four of which (
present The present is the period of time that is occurring now. The present is contrasted with the past, the period of time that has already occurred; and the future, the period of time that has yet to occur. It is sometimes represented as a hyperplan ...
, perfect,
future The future is the time after the past and present. Its arrival is considered inevitable due to the existence of time and the laws of physics. Due to the apparent nature of reality and the unavoidability of the future, everything that currently ex ...
I and II) are used in contemporary Serbo-Croatian, and the other three (
aorist Aorist ( ; abbreviated ) verb forms usually express perfective aspect and refer to past events, similar to a preterite. Ancient Greek grammar had the aorist form, and the grammars of other Indo-European languages and languages influenced by the ...
,
imperfect The imperfect ( abbreviated ) is a verb form that combines past tense (reference to a past time) and imperfective aspect (reference to a continuing or repeated event or state). It can have meanings similar to the English "was doing (something)" o ...
and
pluperfect The pluperfect (shortening of plusquamperfect), usually called past perfect in English, characterizes certain verb forms and grammatical tenses involving an action from an antecedent point in time. Examples in English are: "we ''had arrived''" ...
) used much less frequently. The pluperfect is generally limited to written language and some more educated speakers, and the aorist and imperfect are considered stylistically marked and rather archaic. However, some nonstandard dialects make considerable (and thus unmarked) use of those tenses. Aorist and pluperfect are typically more used in villages and small towns of Serbia than in standard language, even in villages close to the Serbian capital Belgrade. In some parts of Serbia, the aorist can even be the most common past tense. All Serbo-Croatian lexemes in this article are spelled in accented form in the
Latin alphabet The Latin alphabet, also known as the Roman alphabet, is the collection of letters originally used by the Ancient Rome, ancient Romans to write the Latin language. Largely unaltered except several letters splitting—i.e. from , and from ...
as well as in Ijekavian and Ekavian (with Ijekavian bracketed) when these differ. See
Serbo-Croatian phonology Serbo-Croatian is a South Slavic language with four national standards. The Eastern Herzegovinian Neo-Shtokavian dialect forms the basis for Bosnian, Croatian, Montenegrin, and Serbian (the four national standards). Standard Serbo-Croatian ...
.


Nouns

Serbo-Croatian makes a distinction between three genders (masculine, feminine and neuter) seven cases (nominative, genitive, dative, accusative, vocative, locative, instrumental) and two numbers (singular and plural). The dative and locative cases mostly coincide; however, in some nouns they have a different
pitch accent A pitch-accent language is a type of language that, when spoken, has certain syllables in words or morphemes that are prominent, as indicated by a distinct contrasting pitch (music), pitch (tone (linguistics), linguistic tone) rather than by vol ...
: ''grȃd — grȃdu — grádu, stvȃr — stvȃri — stvári''.


Declension

Serbo-Croatian has three main declensional types, traditionally called a-type, e-type and i-type respectively, according to their genitive singular ending.


a-type nouns

This type reflects
Proto-Slavic Proto-Slavic (abbreviated PSl., PS.; also called Common Slavic or Common Slavonic) is the unattested, reconstructed proto-language of all Slavic languages. It represents Slavic speech approximately from the 2nd millennium BC through the 6th ...
o-stems, and is characterized by the endings (-o), (-e), or zero (-Ø) in the nominative singular, and (-a) in genitive singular. It includes most of the masculine and all of the neuter nouns. The category of animacy is important for choosing of accusative singular of o-stems, and of personal pronouns. Animate nouns have the accusative case like the genitive, and inanimate nouns have the accusative case like the nominative. This is also important for adjectives and numerals that agree with masculine nouns in case. This type has two sets of case endings: one for masculine, and the other for neuter gender: The zero ending -Ø is for masculine nouns that end in a consonant in the nominative singular. Most masculine monosyllabic and some bisyllabic words receive an additional suffix -ov- or -ev- throughout the plural (''bor – borovi'' 'pine', ''panj – panjevi'' 'stump'). The choice of -o- and -e- endings in the nominative, vocative and instrumental singular, as well as the plural suffix -ov-/-ev-, is governed by the stem-final consonant: if it is a "soft" (chiefly palatal consonant – ''c, č, ć, đ, j, lj, nj, š, ž, št'', and sometimes ''r''), -e- endings are used, and -o endings otherwise; however, there are exceptions. Some loanwords, chiefly of French origin, preserve the ending vowel (-e, -i, -o, -u) as part of the stem; those ending in -i receive an additional epenthetic -j- suffix in oblique cases: ''kàfē – kafèi'' 'café', ''pànō – panòi'' 'billboard', ''kànū – kanùi'' 'canoe', ''tàksi – taksiji'' 'taxi'. They are always of masculine gender; loanwords ending in -a are typically of the e-declension class (feminine); neuter nouns are basically a
closed class In grammar, a part of speech or part-of-speech ( abbreviated as POS or PoS, also known as word class or grammatical category) is a category of words (or, more generally, of lexical items) that have similar grammatical properties. Words that are ...
.


=Masculine nouns

= Masculine nouns belonging to this declension class are those that are not
hypocorism A hypocorism ( or ; from Ancient Greek ; sometimes also ''hypocoristic''), or pet name, is a name used to show affection for a person. It may be a diminutive form of a person's name, such as ''Izzy'' for Isabel or ''Bob (given name), Bob'' fo ...
s, and do not end in -a, which undergo e-type declension. According to the nominative singular forms they are divided in two classes: # nouns having the zero ending -Ø in nominative singular (twelve declensional patterns) # nouns having the ending -o or -e in nominative singular (two declensional patterns) Masculine nouns ending in -o or -e present a special case. They generally comprise personal names, hypocorisms and certain foreign-language borrowings.


Neuter nouns

Neuter nouns end in -''o'', -''e'' and -''∅''.


=Neuter nouns ending in -''o''

= The final ''o'' is always a suffix. Nouns which have at least two consonants (except ''st'' and ''zd'') before the final ''o'' have disappearing ''a'' in genitive plural. The noun ''dȑvo'' can mean 'wood', in which case it is declined as above (without disappearing a); and 'tree', where it can be declined either as above (without disappearing a) or as an imparisyllabic form below: When the nouns ''ȍko'' and ''ȕho'' mean 'eye' and 'ear', except after a number ending with two-to-four, their plurals are feminine; their plurals are neuter otherwise. Nouns ''čȕdo'' 'miracle', ''kȍlo'' 'wheel', ''nȅbo'' 'sky', ''tijêlo'' 'body' and ''ȕho'' 'ear', in addition to parisyllabic form plurals without disappearing ''a'', have imparisyllabic plurals formed by appending -''es''- to the base. These plurals are used differently. The nominative plural of ''ȕho'' is ''ušèsa'', and the nominative plural of ''tijêlo'' is ''tjelèsa''.


=Neuter nouns ending in -''e''

= The final ''e'' can be a suffix, so the noun is parisyllabic, and it can belong to the noun base, in which case the noun is not parisyllabic. The noun is parisyllabic if it ends with -''je'' (except ''jáje'' in singular), -''lje'', -''nje'' (except ''jȁnje''), -''će'', -''đe'', -''ce'' (except ''pȕce'' and ''tùce''), -''šte'', -''šće'' or -''žđe''. The nouns ''môre'' and ''tlȅ'' are also parisyllabic. If a noun has at least two consonants before the final ''e'', it has a disappearing ''a'' in genitive plural. This is not the case if the noun ends with -''šte'', -''šće'', -''žđe'' or -''je''. Nouns representing living things do not have plural forms, but their plurality is marked with a collective noun formed with -''ād'' (''téle'', n. sg. ''
singulare tantum A ; ) is a noun that appears only in the plural form and does not have a singular variant for referring to a single object. In a less strict usage of the term, it can also refer to nouns whose singular form is rarely used. In English, are oft ...
'' → ''tȅlād'', f. sg. ''singulare tantum'') or by using a noun formed with -''ići'' (''pȉle'', n. sg. ''singulare tantum'' → ''pȉlići'', m. pl.). The noun ''dijéte'' 'child' is a ''singulare tantum'' and uses the collective noun ''djèca'', f. sg. ''singulare tantum'', but plural with verbs, instead of a plural form.


= Other neuter nouns

= The '' pluralia tantum'' nouns ''vráta'', ''ústa'' and ''plúća'' can have the suffix -''ijū'' in genitive plural: ''vrátijū'', ''ústijū'', ''plúćijū''. The only neuter noun ending in -''a'' is ''dȍba''/''dôba'':


e-type nouns

This type reflects Proto-Slavic a-stems, and is characterized by the ending -a in nominative singular and -ē in genitive singular. It contains most of the feminine nouns, and a small number of masculines.


i-type nouns

This type reflects Proto-Slavic i-stems, and is characterized by the zero ending in nominative singular and -i in genitive singular. It contains the rest of feminine nouns, i.e., those that are not contained in the e-type nouns (a-stems). Some nouns appear only in the plural form and do not have a singular variant (see
plurale tantum A ; ) is a noun that appears only in the plural form and does not have a singular variant for referring to a single object. In a less strict usage of the term, it can also refer to nouns whose singular form is rarely used. In English, are oft ...
). The gender of these nouns is either feminine (e.g. ''hlače'' 'trousers', ''gaće'' 'pants', ''grudi'' 'chest') or neuter (e.g. ''kola'' 'car', ''leđa'' 'back', ''usta'' 'mouth').


Pronouns

Serbo-Croatian allows deletion of the subject pronoun, because the inflected verb already contains information about its subject (see
pro-drop language A pro-drop language (from "pronoun-dropping") is a language in which certain classes of pronouns may be omitted when they can be pragmatically or grammatically inferable. The precise conditions vary from language to language, and can be quite ...
). Example: :''Bojim se.'' 'I am afraid.' :''Bojiš se.'' You are afraid. :''Možeš reći što god hoćeš.'' 'You can say whatever you want.' (Note: The words in the brackets represent shorter, unstressed versions of the pronouns that are often used instead of longer, stressed versions. Those unstressed versions, however, only occur in genitive, accusative and dative.)


Adjectives

Some of the declensions for adjectives are the same as for nouns: ''velika'' ''kuća'' (sing. fem. nom.), ''veliku'' ''kuću'' (sing. fem. acc.). Others differ: ''velikog stana'' (sing. masc. gen.), ''jednim'' ''klikom'' 'with one click' (sing. masc. instrum.). * same as nominative if a word is marking inanimate object; same as genitive if a word is marking animate object. * Note: animate objects (people and animals) are treated differently in the singular masculine accusative. In this case, it is the same as singular masculine genitive. It is considered accusative even though it looks like the genitive. Example: ''Vidim velikog psa'' 'I see the big dog'. * Note: most adjectives ending in consonant-'a'-consonant (for example: ''dobar'' 'good'), the 'a' disappears when any sound is added. ''Dobar'' becomes, for example, ''dobri, dobra, dobrog, dobru, dobrim, dobrom, dobre'', and ''dobrih'', according to case and number.


Numerals

Nouns modified by numerals are in the genitive case. As a vestige of the dual number, 2, 3, and 4 take the genitive singular, and 5 and above take the genitive plural. * ''jedan pas'' (one dog) * ''tri psa'' (three dogs) * ''pet pasa'' (five dogs)


Verbs

Like those of other Slavic languages, Serbo-Croatian verbs have a property of aspect: the ''perfective'' and the ''imperfective''. Perfective indicates an action that is completed or sudden, while the imperfective denotes continuous, repeated, or habitual action. Aspect compensates for a relative lack of tenses compared with e.g. Germanic or Romance languages: the verb already contains the information whether the action is completed or lasting, so there is no general distinction between continuous and perfect tenses. Slavic verbs in general are characterized by a relatively low number of stems, from which a wide variety of meanings is achieved by prefixation.


Tense

The
indicative A realis mood ( abbreviated ) is a grammatical mood which is used principally to indicate that something is a statement of fact; in other words, to express what the speaker considers to be a known state of affairs, as in declarative sentence Dec ...
has seven tenses:
present The present is the period of time that is occurring now. The present is contrasted with the past, the period of time that has already occurred; and the future, the period of time that has yet to occur. It is sometimes represented as a hyperplan ...
,
past The past is the set of all Spacetime#Definitions, events that occurred before a given point in time. The past is contrasted with and defined by the present and the future. The concept of the past is derived from the linear fashion in which human ...
, futures I and II,
pluperfect The pluperfect (shortening of plusquamperfect), usually called past perfect in English, characterizes certain verb forms and grammatical tenses involving an action from an antecedent point in time. Examples in English are: "we ''had arrived''" ...
, aorist and imperfect. The last two are not used often in daily speech , especially the imperfect. The imperfect is considered archaic in speech and appears only in certain expressions like "Kako se ''zvaše''" ("What was it called"). The aorist is often used to indicate that something has just now happened, for example "Ispadoše mi ključevi" ("My keys fell down"). The aorist form of the verb "otići" ("to go away") is often used to refer to an immediate future, for example "Odoh na spavanje" ("I'm going to sleep"). Like the present, the aorist and imperfect are formed through inflection, and the other tenses are
periphrastic In linguistics and literature, periphrasis () is the use of a larger number of words, with an implicit comparison to the possibility of using fewer. The comparison may be within a language or between languages. For example, "more happy" is periph ...
: * Past uses the present of ''biti'' 'to be' plus the perfect participle, e.g., ''radio sam'' (or ''sam radio'', order depending on the sentence). * Future I uses the (reduced) present of ''htjeti'' 'will' or 'to want' plus the infinitive, e.g., ''ćemo kuhati'' (or ''kuhat ćemo'', in which case the ''-i'' of the infinitive marker ''-ti'' is elided). * Future II uses the perfective future of ''biti'' (the only verb with a simple future) plus the perfect participle, e.g. ''budu išli''. * Pluperfect, which is not often used, uses the composite past tense of ''biti'' plus the perfect participle, e.g. ''bio sam došao'', or (archaic) imperfect of ''biti'' plus the participle, e.g. ''bijah došao'' Future tense can also be formed with (reduced) present of ''hteti'' plus the conjunction ''da'' and the present of the main verb, e.g. ''ćeš da kuvaš'' in Serbian, but this form is incorrect in Croatian. Also, whereas in Croatian it would be ''radit ćemo'', in Serbian the ''t'' can be omitted and the verbs merged into ''radićemo''. Aorist forms The aorist form depends on the verb's infinitive root (the form without ''-ti'', may be different from the present root). Case where the root ends in a vowel: The infinitive root may not be obvious from the infinitive if it ends in a consonant, because the root ending interacted with the ''t'' of ''-ti'' during the language's development. These were the sound changes: This is the source of infinitives with ''-ći'' instead of ''-ti'' (except ići). Roots of these kinds should then technically be known by heart, but they happen to be equal to the present root forms. An alternate aorist form is used with these verbs: an ''-o-'' is infixed in some cases, and ''-e'' is used in 2nd/3rd sg. Before the front vowel ''e'', the velars ''k'' and ''g'' regularly turn into ''č'' and ''ž'' respectively. A verb with an irregular inf. root ending in a consonant. Correspondingly, the 2nd aorist form described is used: The use of this apparently extraneous (when compared to the infinitive) ''d'' has spread to other verbs, most notably verbs on ''-stati'' and ''znati''. Exemplary ''postati'' (to become): How to use the aorist? It is used only with verbs of the perfective aspect 1: For actions that have just now happened, right before you talk about it (often with an emotional nuance): Examples: "''Ujede'' me komarac" ("A mosquito bit me") "''Ode'' mi autobus" ("I missed the bus/The bus went away") "Baš sad ''htedoh'' da te nazovem" ("I just wanted to call you") "''Uništiše'' mi ovi moljci košulju" ("These moths destroyed my shirt") "''Pomislih'' na tebe" ("I have just thought about you") 2: One time actions that happened at some point in the past. This meaning of the aorist appears often in storytelling "Bio sam u kući, kad neki ljudi ''zakucaše'' na vrata. ''Ustadoh'' da vidim ko je" ("I was at home when someone knocked at the door. I got up to see who it is") 3: Actions that are just about to happen. Limited to certain verbs "Odoh sad u školu" ("I'm going to school now") "Pomresmo od gladi" ("We are starving")


Mood

Besides the
indicative A realis mood ( abbreviated ) is a grammatical mood which is used principally to indicate that something is a statement of fact; in other words, to express what the speaker considers to be a known state of affairs, as in declarative sentence Dec ...
, Serbo-Croatian uses the imperative, conditional, and the optative. Imperative forms vary according to the type of the verb, and are formed by adding the appropriate morpheme to a verbal stem. The conditional I (present) uses the
aorist Aorist ( ; abbreviated ) verb forms usually express perfective aspect and refer to past events, similar to a preterite. Ancient Greek grammar had the aorist form, and the grammars of other Indo-European languages and languages influenced by the ...
of ''biti'' plus perfect participle, while conditional II (past) consists of the perfect participle of ''biti'', the aorist of the same verb, and the perfect participle of the main verb. Some grammars classify future II as a conditional tense, or even a mood of its own. Optative is in its form identical to the perfect participle. It is used by speakers to express a strong wish, e.g. ''Živio predsjednik!'' 'Long live the president!', ''Dabogda ti se sjeme zatrlo!'' 'May God let your seed destroyed' (an archaic and dialectal curse), etc. The optative may be translated into English by an imperative construction, with set phrases (such as the already exemplified 'long live'), or by use of the modal verb ''may''. Some authors suggest existence of
subjunctive The subjunctive (also known as the conjunctive in some languages) is a grammatical mood, a feature of an utterance that indicates the speaker's attitude toward it. Subjunctive forms of verbs are typically used to express various states of unrealit ...
mood, realized as ''da'' plus the present of indicative, but most grammars treat it as present indicative.


Aspect

Verbal aspect is distinguished in English by using the simple or progressive (continuous) forms. 'He washed the dishes' indicates that the action was finished; 'He was washing the dishes' indicates that the action was ongoing (progressive). Serbo-Croatian, like all Slavic languages, has the aspect built into the verbs, rather than expressing it with different tenses. To compare the meanings of the different aspects with verbal aspect in English, one should know three basic aspects: completed (may be called preterite, aorist, or perfect according to the language in question), progressive (on-going but not completed yet, durative), and iterative (habitual or repeated). English uses one aspect for completed and iterative and another for progressive. Serbo-Croatian uses one for completed and another for iterative and progressive. Aspect is the most challenging part of Serbo-Croatian grammar. Although aspect exists in all other Slavic languages, learners of Serbo-Croatian who already know even one of several other Slavic languages may never learn to use aspect correctly, though they will be understood with only rare problems. While there are bi-aspectual verbs as well, primarily those derived by adding the suffix ''-irati'' or ''-ovati'', the majority of verbs not derived in such a manner are either perfective (''svršeni'') or imperfective (''nesvršeni''). Almost all of the single aspectual verbs are part of a perfective–imperfective pair of verbs. When learning a verb, one must learn its verbal aspect, and the other verb for the opposite verbal aspect, e.g. ''prati'' 'to do washing' (imperfective) goes with ''oprati'' 'to wash' (perfective). The pairing, however, is not always one to one: some verbs simply don't have a counterpart on a semantic level, such as ''izgledati'' 'seem' or ''sadržati'' 'contain'. In others, there are several perfective alternatives with slightly different meanings. There are two paradigms concerning formation of verb pairs. In one paradigm, the base verb is imperfective, such as ''prati'' 'to wash'. In this case the perfective is formed by adding a ''prefix'', in this case ''o'', as in ''oprati''. In the other paradigm, the root verb is perfective, and the imperfective is formed either by modifying the root: ''dignuti''→''dizati'' 'to lift', or adding an
interfix An interfix or linking element is a part of a word that is placed between two morphemes (such as two roots or a root and a suffix) and lacks a semantic meaning. Examples Formation of compound words In German, the interfix ''-s-'' has to be ...
: ''stati''→''stajati'' 'to stop', 'to stand'. A pattern which often arises can be illustrated with ''pisati'' 'to write'. ''Pisati'' is imperfective, so a prefix is needed to make it perfective, in this case ''na-'': ''napisati''. But if other prefixes are added, modifying the meaning, the verb becomes perfective: ''zapisati'' 'to write down' or ''prepisati'' 'to copy by hand'. Since these basic verbs are perfective, an interfix is needed to make them imperfective: ''zapisivati'' and ''prepisivati''. In some cases, this could be continued by adding a prefix: ''pozapisivati'' and ''isprepisivati'' which are again perfective.


Conjugation

There are three conjugations of verbs: # 'a': almost all verbs that have this conjugation end in '-ati'. # 'e': verbs ending in '-nuti' and all irregular verbs (as in the example below). Verbs ending in '-ovati', '-ivati' become 'uje' when conjugated (''trovati'' 'to poison' is ''trujem'', ''truje'' etc.) # 'i': almost all verbs ending in '-jeti' or '-iti' use this conjugation.


Auxiliary verbs

As in most other Indo-European languages including English, the Indo-European copula ('to be') is used as an auxiliary verb. It is universally irregular, because conjugations of two proto-forms ''*h1es-'' (>English ''is'') and ''*bʰuH-'' (>English ''be'') merged, producing mixed paradigms: the former being used in the present, and the latter in the other tenses. In Serbo-Croatian, however, there are two present forms surviving: ''jesam'' ('I am') and ''budem'' ('I be'). Because of that dualism, some grammars (chiefly Serbian ones) treat ''jesam'' as a
defective verb In linguistics, a defective verb is a verb that either lacks a conjugated form or entails incomplete conjugation, and thus cannot be conjugated for certain grammatical tenses, aspects, persons, genders, or moods that the majority of verbs or ...
having only present tense. Others treat these forms as two realizations of the same irregular verb ''biti'', ''jesam'' being imperfective and ''budem'' perfective. ''Jesam'' has the following conjugation in the present tense. It has long and
clitic In morphology and syntax, a clitic ( , backformed from Greek "leaning" or "enclitic"Crystal, David. ''A First Dictionary of Linguistics and Phonetics''. Boulder, CO: Westview, 1980. Print.) is a morpheme that has syntactic characteristics of a ...
(short) forms (without leading ''je''), while its negative form is written as one word, unlike other verbs (compare English ''is''–''isn't''). The short and the negative forms are used as auxiliary, while the long form is marked. The copulative use of the verb ''јеsam'' matches that of the verb 'to be' in English (e.g. He ''is'' a student – On ''је'' učenik), of course, in the present tense only. The 'true' forms present of the verb ''biti'', (''budem'') have a limited use (in formation of the future exact tense, or in conditional clauses referring to the future, e.g. ''ako budem'' – ''if I am''). Verb ''biti'' is conjugated as follows:


Regular verbs

The conjugation system of regular verbs is rather complex. There are several classes of verbs distinguished according to certain features verbs within a class share.
The verb is raditi (''To work'') The present tense of "reći" is rare. It's replaced by the present tense of the verb "kazati". "Reći" is a verb of the perfective aspect and hence it doesn't have the imperfect tense.


Irregular verbs

Irregular verbs A regular verb is any verb whose Verb conjugation, conjugation follows the typical pattern, or one of the typical patterns, of the language to which it belongs. A verb whose conjugation follows a different pattern is called an irregular verb. Th ...
are more complex to conjugate than regular verbs, for example the verb moći (''can, to be able to'')


Adverbs

Adverbs in Serbo-Croatian are, unlike nouns, verbs, adjectives, pronouns and numbers, and like prepositions, conjunctions, exclamations and particles, immutable words. Adverbs are, thus, immutable words given to verbs to determine the time, place, manner, cause, point and the amount of the action of the verb. There are seven types of adverbs in Serbo-Croatian:


Place adverbs

Place adverbs (') answer the questions where? (''gdje?''), to where? (''kamo?''), which way? (''kuda?''), from where? (''otkuda?, odakle?'') and to where? (''dokle?, dokud?''). Examples for each type are: :''gde/gdje?'' (where) ::''ovde/ovdje'' (here), ::''negde''/''negdje'' (somewhere), ::''nigde''/''nigdje'' (nowhere), ::''igde''/''igdje'' (anywhere), ::''gore'' (up), ::''dole''/''dolje'' (down), ::''odpozadi''/''straga'' (from behind), ::''napolju''/''vani'' (outside) ::''blizu'' (close by); :''kuda/kamo?'' (to where) ::''ovamo'' (to here) ::''napred''/''naprijed'' (forwards) ::''nazad'' (backwards); :''kuda?'' (which way) ::''ovuda'' (this way), ::''kojekuda'' (''otišli su kojekuda'' – they dispersed), :''otkuda?'' (from where) :: ''odavde'' (from here), ::''niotkuda'' (from nowhere), ::''izdaleka'' (from far away) :''dokle?'' (to where): ::''dotle'' (to here, also used as 'in the mean time', ''dotle su oni čekali''), ::''donekle'' (up to a point).


Temporal adverbs

Temporal adverbs, or ''vremenski prilozi'', answer the questions when? (kada?), from when? (otkad?), until when? (dokad?). Examples are: kada (when) – sada (now), tada (then), nikada (never), ponekad (sometimes), uvijek (always), jučer (yesterday), danas (today), sutra (tomorrow), prekosutra (the day after tomorrow), lani (last year), večeras (tonight), odmah/smjesta (now/at once), zatim (then), uskoro (soon), napokon (at last); otkad (from when) – odsad (from now on), oduvijek (from always – oduvijek sam te volio – I have (from) always loved you); dokad (until when) – dosad (until now), dogodine (next year).


Prepositions

Each preposition has an assigned case. If an inflectable word follows a preposition, the word is declined in the same case as the preposition's assigned case. Genitive prepositions: ::''od, do, iz, s(a), ispred, iza, izvan, van, unutar, iznad, ispod, više, poviše, niže, prije, uoči, poslije, nakon, za, tijekom, tokom, dno (podno, nadno, odno), vrh (povrh, navrh, uvrh, zavrh), čelo, nakraj, onkraj, krajem, potkraj, sred (nasred, posred, usred), oko, okolo, blizu, kod, kraj, pokraj, pored, nadomak, nadohvat, i, u, mimo, duž, uzduž, širom, diljem, preko, bez, osim, mjesto (umjesto, namjesto), uime, putem, (s) pomoću, posredstvom, između, (na)spram, put, protiv, nasuprot, usuprot, usprkos, unatoč, zbog, uslijed, radi (zaradi, poradi), glede, prigodom, prilikom, povodom'' Dative prepositions: ::''k(a), prema, naprama, nadomak, nadohvat, nasuprot, usuprot, usprkos, unatoč, protiv'' Accusative prepositions: ::''kroz, niz, uz, na, o, po, u, mimo, među, nad, pod, pred, za'' Locative prepositions: ::''na, o, po, prema, pri, u'' Instrumental prepositions: ::''s(a), pred, za, nad(a), pod(a), među'' ;Dynamic v. Static Some prepositions fall in two or more cases. The ones that fall in both the accusative and locative cases, the preposition is accusative if it is dynamic and is locative if it is static. Dynamic means that the preposition shows motion while static does not. Examples: ::''Ja idem u školu.'' I am going to school. (dynamic) ::''Ja sam u školi.'' I am in school. (static)


Conjunctions and particles


Syntax


Word order

Serbo-Croatian has a rich case structure that is reflected in the declension of nouns and adjectives. That allows for a great deal of freedom in
word order In linguistics, word order (also known as linear order) is the order of the syntactic constituents of a language. Word order typology studies it from a cross-linguistic perspective, and examines how languages employ different orders. Correlatio ...
. In English, for example, the word order shows a difference in meaning between "Man bites dog" and "Dog bites man". In Serbo-Croatian, ''Čovjek grize psa'' and ''Čovjeka grize pas'' have the same word order, but the meanings are shown by the noun endings. Any order of the three constituents is grammatically correct, and the meaning is clear because of the declensions. However, the usual order is subject–verb–object, as in English. Serbo-Croatian closely observes Wackernagel's Law that
clitic In morphology and syntax, a clitic ( , backformed from Greek "leaning" or "enclitic"Crystal, David. ''A First Dictionary of Linguistics and Phonetics''. Boulder, CO: Westview, 1980. Print.) is a morpheme that has syntactic characteristics of a ...
s (unstressed functional words) are placed in the second position in all
clause In language, a clause is a Constituent (linguistics), constituent or Phrase (grammar), phrase that comprises a semantic predicand (expressed or not) and a semantic Predicate (grammar), predicate. A typical clause consists of a subject (grammar), ...
s. The first element may be a single word or a
noun phrase A noun phrase – or NP or nominal (phrase) – is a phrase that usually has a noun or pronoun as its head, and has the same grammatical functions as a noun. Noun phrases are very common cross-linguistically, and they may be the most frequently ...
: ''Taj je čovjek rekao'' 'That man (has) said', or ''Taj čovjek je rekao''. Multiple clitics are grouped in the following fixed order: # question word (only ''li''), # verbs: clitic forms of 'to be' except ''je'' (''sam'', ''si'', ''smo'', ''ste'', ''su'', ''bih'', ''bi'', ''bismo'', ''biste''), and of 'will' (''ću, ćeš, će, ćemo'', and ''ćete'') # dative pronouns (''mi, ti, mu, joj, nam, vam, im, si''), # accusative pronouns (''me, te, ga, je, ju, nas, vas, ih''), # the reflexive accusative pronoun (only ''se''), # clitic form of the third-person singular present of 'to be' (''je'').


Relative clauses

Relative clauses are frequent in modern Serbo-Croatian since they have expanded as attributes at the expense of the participles performing that function. The most frequent
relativizer In linguistics, a relativizer (list of glossing abbreviations, abbreviated ) is a type of Conjunction (grammar), conjunction that introduces a relative clause. For example, in English, the conjunction ''that'' may be considered a relativizer in a s ...
is the
relative pronoun A relative pronoun is a pronoun that marks a relative clause. An example is the word ''which'' in the sentence "This is the house which Jack built." Here the relative pronoun ''which'' introduces the relative clause. The relative clause modifies th ...
''koji''. It has the greatest range of antecedents, which, however, are mostly nouns or personal pronouns. Nouns are the word class with attributes, and the relative clause is most frequently an attributive clause. The frequency of the adjectival pronoun ''koji'' is greater than those relative pronouns that cannot have an antecedent noun (''tko'' ʻwhoʼ and the declinable type of ''što'' 'what'). Also, it occurs much more frequently than other adjectival relative pronouns: in comparison with their specialized semantic functions such as possessiveness (''čiji'' 'whose'), quality (''kakav'' 'what sort of') or quantity (''koliki'' 'how large'), the pronoun ''koji'' has the broadest scope of
reference A reference is a relationship between objects in which one object designates, or acts as a means by which to connect to or link to, another object. The first object in this relation is said to ''refer to'' the second object. It is called a ''nam ...
and identification with the
referent A referent ( ) is a person or thing to which a name – a linguistic expression or other symbol – refers. For example, in the sentence ''Mary saw me'', the referent of the word ''Mary'' is the particular person called Mary who is being spoken o ...
.


See also

* Ausbausprache * Differences between Serbo-Croatian standard varieties * Language secessionism in Serbo-Croatian *
Mutual intelligibility In linguistics, mutual intelligibility is a relationship between different but related language varieties in which speakers of the different varieties can readily understand each other without prior familiarity or special effort. Mutual intelli ...
* Pluricentric Serbo-Croatian language *
Serbo-Croatian language Serbo-Croatian ( / ), also known as Bosnian-Croatian-Montenegrin-Serbian (BCMS), is a South Slavic language and the primary language of Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Montenegro. It is a pluricentric language with four mutuall ...
*
Serbo-Croatian phonology Serbo-Croatian is a South Slavic language with four national standards. The Eastern Herzegovinian Neo-Shtokavian dialect forms the basis for Bosnian, Croatian, Montenegrin, and Serbian (the four national standards). Standard Serbo-Croatian ...
* Serbo-Croatian kinship * Serbo-Croatian relative clauses * Shtokavian dialect * South Slavic dialect continuum *
Standard language A standard language (or standard variety, standard dialect, standardized dialect or simply standard) is any language variety that has undergone substantial codification in its grammar, lexicon, writing system, or other features and that stands ...


References


Further reading

* * * * * * * * * * * st pub *
(CROLIB)
*
(CROLIB)
*
(CROLIB)
*
ContentsSummary
. *
Summary
* *
ÖNB
. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Serbo-Croatian Grammar Serbo-Croatian language Croatian language Serbian language Bosnian language Montenegrin language Slavic grammars