Slovak: Accusative case declension for the statement 'I have (number of something).'

L

lafz_puchnevala

Senior Member
Tamil
Hey guys,

I am not sure of the pattern of the change of the numbers when answering the above question with 'I have..' ie. in the accusative case. Does it change like an adjective change of form?

Eg1. I have two sisters. The correct version is 'mám dve sestry'.
I have three sisters. The correct version says 'mám tri sestry.' I understand 'dva' changing to 'dve' in the female plural accusative form but why isn't 'tri' changing to 'tre'? Is it an exception?

Similar with Eg2. I have one child. mám jedno dieťa.
I am under the impression it will be 'jedne' instead similar to 'mám moje/svoje dieťa'?

Cheers
 
    • Hi lafz_puchnevala, the Slovak numerals dva and tri have comparable, but not identical, declension patterns. As you can see here (slovake.eu/en/learning/grammar/classes/numbers), dve ženy and tri ženy are the correct forms in both the nominative and accusative cases, and žena is a feminine noun. You can also find the declension pattern of jedno (= neuter) on that same linked page. Jedne :cross:is not possible in the Slovak declension pattern jeden (= masculine ) / jedna (= feminine) / jedno (= neuter). Dieťa is a neuter noun.
    Numerals have to agree in number (singular or plural), case (nominative, genitive, dative, accusative, locative/prepositional, instrumental) and gender (mascuine, feminine, neuter) with the noun they qualify.
     
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    I see what you mean. So, numerals acting as adjectives have their own separate declination patterns!
    Wow. Its more complicated. I was thinking the declination pattern will be the same as for normal adjectives such 'tall woman', 'big car' etc.
     
    I think that this seemingly strange patterns may come from a fact that Slavic language used to have separate forms for dual. In Slovenian, where we still have dual forms for nouns, we have "dve sestri" and "tri sestre".
     
    I was under the impression that numeral 1 can have masculine, feminine and neuter endings (-zero, -a, -o), 2 can have masculine (same as neuter) and feminine (-a and -e), and 3+ don’t distinguish between grammatical genders.
     
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