Slovak Declension

Slovak Declension

The Slovak language, like most Slavic and Latin languages, is an inflected language, meaning that the endings (and sometimes also the stems) of most words (nouns, adjectives, pronouns and numerals) change depending on the given combination of the grammatical gender, the grammatical number and the grammatical case of the particular word in the particular sentence:

a) Gender: There are four grammatical genders in Slovak language: animate masculine, inanimate masculine, feminine and neuter. In popular description, the first two genders are often covered under common masculine gender. Almost all Slovak nouns and adjectives, as well as some pronouns and numerals can be categorized into one of these genders. Exceptions are pluralia tantum (Vianoce - Christmas) and words that are drifting into other gender and are currently in the neuter (knieža - Fürst), and masculine animals that are animate in singular and mostly inanimate in plural.

b) Number: Like in English, there is the singular and the plural. Morphological traces of ancient dual number remained, but are not a separate grammar category anymore. A particular case is associated with three distinct groups of numerals associated with nouns:

• 1 (one) - nominative case singular, for example jeden dub (one oak)
• 2, 3, 4 - nominative case plural, for example dva duby (two oaks)
• 0, 5 and more - genitive case plural, for example päť dubov (five oaks)

c) Morphological cases:

• the nominative case (N) = the subject; the basic form of the word; answers the question Who / What; for example father (sg), fathers (pl)
• the genitive case (G) =
  • (1) in English "of x" or "x's" ; answers the questions Of whom / Of what; for example father's (sg. ), fathers' (pl);
  • (2) is used after the prepositions bez (without), blízko (near), do (to, into), doprostred (in(to) the middle of), mimo (out(side) of), miesto (instead of), okolo (around), od (from), podľa (according to), pomimo (next to, around), pomocou (by means of), pozdĺž (along), u (at), uprostred (in the middle of), vedľa (next to, adjacent to), vnútri (in, inside of), vyše (above), z (out of, from), *za (behind)
• the dative case (D) =
  • (1) in English "to x"; answers the question To whom / To what; for example to the father (sg), to the fathers (pl);
  • (2) is used after the prepositions k (to, towards), kvôli (because of), napriek (in spite of), naproti (facing, opposing), oproti ((facing, opposing)), voči (facing, against)
• the accusative case (A) =
  • (1) the direct object; answers the question Whom / What; for example father (sg), fathers (pl);
  • (2) is used after the prepositions: cez(through), *medzi (between, among), *na (on, at), *nad (above), *po (after, for), *o (about, on), *pod (under), pre (for, because of), *pred (before, in front of), *v (in, on), vzhľadom na (regarding, concerning), *za (behind, for)
• the locative case (L) = used after the prepositions *na (on), *po (after), *o (about, on), pri (at, next to), *v (in, on)
• the instrumental case (I) =
  • (1) in English "by (means of) x"; answers the question By (means of) whom / By (means of) what; for example by the father;
  • (2) is used after the prepositions: *medzi (between, among), *nad (above), *pod, (under), *pred (before, in front of), s (with), *za (behind, at the back of)
• The (syntactic) vocative case (V) is not morphologically marked anymore in modern Slovak (unlike in modern Czech). Today the (syntactic) vocative is realised by the (morphological) nominative case, just like in English, German and many other languages. However, the ancient vocative declensions have survived (mostly in conserved, archaic words or language, e.g. in fairy tales, folklore, or in an ironic sense) in some words, some examples: syn (son) - V: synku, brat (brother) - V: bratu, bratku), chlapec (boy, knave) - V:chlapče), švagor (brother-in-law) - V: švagre or N, kmotor (godparent) - V:kmotre or N), chlap (man, male) - V: chlape, priateľ (friend) V: priateľu or N, pán (mister, lord) - V: pane or N), majster (master artist) - V: majstre or N), boh (god) - V: bože, mama (mum, mother) - V: mamo, mami) and was retrofitted (with the help of Czech influence) to some more words, like šéf (chief, boss) - V: šéfe. There is a dispute among some Slovak linguists whether to include vocative into grammar categories but with declension (mostly) equal to the nominative, or to unify it with nominative case category. But since the morphological vocative is used only for the above restricted number of words and in addition only in some contexts, it is surely an exaggeration to say that the (morphological) vocative is still in the Slovak language. Note however that there is no dispute that the syntactic vocative is present in Slovak (and in every other language). Slovak schools have been teaching for at least 30 years that there is no grammar category of vocative anymore in use, and since 1990 they have not mentioned the vocative at all. Also, the Slovak Encyclopedia of Linguistics (1993) explicitly says: the vocative is nowadays replaced by the nominative.

However, there is a different form of morphological vocative emerging in spoken language, used with some familiar forms of personal names (Paľo - Pali, Jano, Jana - Jani, Zuza - Zuzi) and familiar forms of kinship words, such as mama - mami (mum, mother), oco - oci (dad, father), tata, tato - tati (dad, daddy), baba, babka - babi (gran, granny, grandmother). This usage is very similar to the "new Russian vocative" (Маш', Петь', мам'), and it is not accepted into standardised codified language. This probably developed out of proper names that were formed using the Hungarian diminutive suffix -i and that are used in spoken Slovak, and therefore is often homonymous with nominative (semi-)diminutive forms of the names.