bulgarian

I've read that Bulgarian has no cases except for pronouns. However, can these be examples of cases? In this sentence the focus is on the noun: приятел Какво значи да сънуваш приятеля (Accusative) си. (What does it mean to dream of your friend.) Where according to definition the accusative...

I've been learning Bulgarian for a couple of months now, and I've just encountered a phenomenon which blew my mind: using the perfective verbs in the present tense. Let's take an example: Аз купувам колело. (impf) Аз купя колело. (pf) What does the structure with the perfective verb actually...

Hi, What are the differences between съм and бъда? The former is cognate of a Polish verb 'jestem' (i am), while the latter - cognate of 'będę' (I will be), but considering that the Bulgarian future tense is analítical, and I've encountered both "ще съм' and 'ще бъда' (as far as I understand...

Words can have a definite article (определителен член) at the end. But apparently not always? For example, why is it "Детето ми е високо" but "Майка ми е висока" or "Баща ми е висок"? Other examples: "Синът ми е лекар" but "Дъщеря ми е лекарка". That being said, the following seems correct...

Hello everyone. I see that in Bulgaria there is a toponym "Sulovo" and surname Sulova. It comes from "Sulo" (ϹЪЛО ?). Is this "sulo" understood in Bulgarian, or is it Albanian (probably meaning "wooden pole")? Thanks for the answers.

Why do Bulgarian verbs веза and греба change their emphasis in aorist form? Thank you everyone in advance.

From a company's financial statements: I don't understand how the highlighted part coheres grammatically with the rest of the sentence. Is it saying something like "... insofar as those cash flows arise ..."? Also, is this syntax normal and grammatical for Bulgarian? Thanks, Gavril

An electricity bill from Bulgaria contains a table with the following headings: A translator has rendered "кВтч" as KWh = "kilowatt hour(s)". I'm not familiar with Bulgarian abbreviations, but this reading at least makes sense based on the Bulgarian words for "kilowatt" and "hour". But I'm...

Hello, Could anybody please provide me some diminutive forms of my name? (Originally, in Bulgarian it'd be Доротея) But I mainly use Дори or Дорци as a nickname, but I'd like to know if there are some more variations of these two? :) For example: (From Дедислава->) Деси -> Десито I'm especially...

Hello, I've read that 11 in Bulgarian is "edin-no-deset" and 12 "dva-na-deset". What is the function of no/na? I'm trying to understand the logic behind the formation of those numbers. Thanks in advance.

Здравейте, Recently, I started watching Bulgarian cartoons with subtitles. In one of these cartoons, I came across this sentence: 'Къде ме водиж, Господин бръмбар?' The owner of this sentence asks the question to someone, addressing him/her politely. However, as far as I know, present tense...

What is the grammatical role of the last element in the Bulgarian constructions like Известия на Народния музей Варна? The French translation suggests it might be a genitive (de Varna) with just the preposition omitted, is it so? Or is it rather a complement as sometimes found in other...

Здравейте, I have always read in grammar books that the short possessive pronoun is placed after the noun, or after the adjective if the noun is qualified by an adjective: Къде са чорапи ми? Къде са сините ми чорапи? However, the following sentence is also valid: Къде са ми сините чорапи...

Здравейте на всички! I often come across sentences with different word orders and Bulgarian is somewhat strange in some ways. Sometimes, it is quite logical and sometimes the opposite... So I just wanted to make sure and learn about the difference for below statements. 1) Много добре съм 2)...

Здравейте, I came back with another question which may be simple for Bulgarian users. Recently I have learned that all Bulgarian verbs has incomplete and complete forms. Some are similar while some are very dinstictive but usage differs according to tenses. But among these, I met some verbs...

Dear Bulgarian speakers, After learning "род" in Bulgarian, I got confused about some statements in Bulgarian. Since all nouns have genders, you treat them as "he" or "she" or "it" in Bulgarian and add stems accordingly. I wonder if you can use "той, тя, то" instead of nouns as well. Eg. when...

Hi there, can someone help me decipher the written text on the back of a photograph please? I think it's written Bulgarian cyrilic perhaps combined with the latin script. Not neccessarily the Bulgarian language though. The picture depicts a soldier in a uniform from around the 1900s. He...

In East Slavic the first syllable is stressed. In Serbo-Croatian the first syllable is stressed and there is a falling accent, which generally means that the position of the accent hasn't changed over time. Wiktionary also cites Derksen (2008) as saying that the reconstructed proto-Slavic form...

iOS 14 started displaying text marked as Bulgarian using the special Bulgarian style of Cyrillic letters. I recall having seen it in a book printed in Bulgaria in the Soviet times, but then I thought it was just a kind of ornamental font (resembling Georgian script). My question is, what is the...

Hello Bulgarian speakers; Here I am again with another confusion. I recently met two different usages of the same pattern. You use "трябва да си отивам" which means I must go and the verm "отивам" ends with the usual "-м" in order to express first singular person which is "I". On the other...

Hello Bulgarian speakers, I am learning Bulgarian and I try to understand the logic behind things. As a mature learner, it only makes sense when you know the logic and define rules. I am familiar with the genders of the words and their rules according to word endings. According to the rule...

Hello, According to some page, when they are in stressed syllables, ъ is pronounced /ɤ/, у is pronounced /u/, and о is pronounced /ɔ/; and when they are in unstressed syllables, ъ is pronounced [ɐ] (like а), and у and о are pronounced [o]. My question is: do we really need to differentiate...

Hello, Please, can you help me? There is a product label here. There is a sort of sweet red pepper called in Romanian "ardei capia" and in English "Florina pepper". The Romanian dictionaries say that "capia" is a Bulgarian word (капия). What does it mean? I've found only this text: Столетия...

Hello word reference community. It is my first thread and I am very curious about learning Bulgarian. It is best to know the logic behind words when learning a new language and I got confused about some words in Bulgarian language. When using present simple tense with the first singular person...

Hello, I tried to find out the etymology of name Preda and I wrote on wordreference here about my research. It is said that it is a Slavic name and it comes in Romanian from Bulgarian. My reasoning may be certain, but sometimes you can never be completely sure. Please, could you tell me if...

What is the significance of articles in Macedonian and Bulgarian? Correct me if I’m wrong, but these are the only Slavic languages that use some system of articles. Does anyone have any insight on how and why this system developed?

What is the difference between these two words that mean sadness/sad?

Здрасти! I am trying to understand whether there is a difference in usage between току-що and тъкмо, both meaning "just" as in "something just happened". I asked several people and had several different answers. Some people suggest that in some contexts both can be used interchangeably...

Hi everyone, Here's another question about Bulgarian word order (that's a big struggle). I know it can be complicated but I found the following very clear rule in my grammar book: It doesn't seem that bad. This comes with the following examples: Не бяхме му го дали Не бяхте ли му го...

Hi everyone, I am a bit confused by the tense used in the IF clause in past conditionals, in Bulgarian, where the past perfect would normally be used in English. For example, it would be correct to say, in English, "If the weather had been good, I would have gone out" (past perfect) But it...

Hi everyone, I am a bit confused by the reflexive nature of срещам (whether it is used with the "се" particle or not). I have seen the following sentences: - На улицата срещнах колегата си - not reflexive - Накрая, тя не искаше повече да се срещаме - reflexive - Никога не сме го срещали -...

Hi everyone, According to my grammar books, the dative clitics like "ми" are short for long forms like "на мен". So it seems to me that most, if not all sentences should work with one аnd the other. However I am often told be natives that the long forms don't sound right. For example: Те са...

Hello, I am trying to find out which is correct, if speaking formally to one female person: 1) Какво бихте искала? 2) Какво бихте искали? I think I more commonly hear the first, but it may be that only the second one is in fact correct. Is that the case? Thank you

Hi, I was wondering if anyone had any guidance on choosing the verb зная or познавам, that both translate to "to know" in English. I couldn't find any info online (admittedly my research skills in Bulgarian are pretty limited), but my gut tells me that they work like 'saber' and 'conocer' in...

Hi everyone, I'm currently studying the Bulgarian conditional mood and I'm a bit confused by the tense. For example: Той никога не би направил това Does that mean: 1) "He would never do that" (he hasn't done it yet), or 2) "He would never have done that" (someone has done it) From my...

The prescriptivist rules for the artificial long/short masculine article usage mention that the long article should be used in situations where popular European languages with cases, eg. Latin or German, use the nominative case, so after съм, ставам/стана се etc. Among thеse verbs one can find...

Hi, All of my grammar books mention that the short dative pronoun should be placed before the verb (unless the subject pronoun is omitted and the dative pronoun has to move after the verb, as a sentence cannot start with an unaccentuated word): Тя ѝ помага I noticed that in some questions...

Hi, I'm looking for a bulgarian translation of the expression "Be a man, my son!". I translated it in "бъди мъж, сине мой!", but I'm not self-confident about. Could you help me please?

както / като / тъй като all mean "as" according to the dictionary, but I can't work out from the examples when to use which, as they seem to be used in similar sentences (and are possibly interchangeable in some of them?). Is there an easy was to know when to use which? Thank you!

I'm a bit confused about where to put the и in numbers. I had a rule, about it being before the last digit but it doesn't really seem to work. Some confusing examples: 261 - двеста шестдесет и един 260 - двеста и шестдесет 306,000 - триста и шест хиляди 326,567 - триста двадесет и шест хиляди...

I'm about confused about whether I should or shouldn't use a definite article on long possessive pronouns. Here are two examples: Ще говоря с неговия братовчед Ще говоря с негов братовчед Не съм неговия братовчед Не съм негов братовчед It seems like there is something that makes it ok to use...

I am a bit confused by the placement of the subject (generally, but in particular in questions). I know that the subject pronoun can usually be omitted, but what if you want to have it? Ти къде отиваш? Куде отиваш ти? I'm told the second one is used but may not be grammatically correct? What...

Hi everyone, and thank you for all of your answers to my many questions about the Bulgarian language so far :-) I am wondering about the use of което vs каквото in sentences such as: Какво търсиш? - Това е което/каквото търся. Какво каза той? - Това е което/каквото каза. Since the question...

I am trying to understand the difference in usage between the aorist and imperfect tenses. I understand that the aorist is more or less the equivalent of the preterite in English, while the imperfect would be the equivalent of the past progressive tense. That is a very rough approximation, of...

Hi, I understand that both чий and на кого can be used to ask about possession ("whose?"). However, they don't seem to be fully interchangeable. For example, "Чии обувки са?" would be correct but I'm told that "На кого обувки са?" sounds off. Does any one have any guidance for proper usage of...

Hello everyone, I am very confused about the use of definite articles when expressing a generalization such as: Жените харесват котки. In general, women like cats, not referring to a particular group of women or a particular group of cats. In this sentence the subject is definite but the...

Hello everyone, I have a question about the plural of крак in Bulgarian. According to this dictionary, the plural is кракове and the counting form is крака (nothing supprising here). However, I seem to find крака used as the normal plural, as in "Болят ме краката". Is the dictionary just...

Добър ден, познавах само думата крак на български език, но днес видях терминa нога. Каква е разликата между тези две понятия? Eдин речник в интернет информира, че нога е диалектна форма.

Hi! Please, can anybody provide some common diminutive forms of the personal names Мария and Виктория in Bulgarian, as used with children or young girls? Thank you in advance! :)

Hello everybody. I would like to know whether there is any difference in pronunciation between строите (present indicative) and стройте (imperative). Thanks beforehand.