{"id":491,"date":"2009-03-04T11:27:42","date_gmt":"2009-03-04T15:27:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/?p=491"},"modified":"2009-03-04T11:27:42","modified_gmt":"2009-03-04T15:27:42","slug":"cardinal-numbers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/cardinal-numbers\/","title":{"rendered":"Cardinal Numbers"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The post where I attempted to count priests (is it \u201c<strong>dwaj ksi\u0119\u017ca<\/strong>\u201d or \u201c<strong>dw\u00f3ch ksi\u0119\u017cy<\/strong>\u201d?) made me realize that we\u2019ve never talked about numbers before. Hmmm\u2026 I wonder why I\u2019ve been avoiding this particular topic. Really, no reason at all.<br \/>\nYeah, right!<\/p>\n<p>Ok, in that case, let\u2019s get started.<\/p>\n<p>I\u2019m sure that most, if not all of you, know the simple <strong>jeden, dwa, trzy, cztery<\/strong>, etc already.<br \/>\nThe good news that these simple, straightforward numbers are super easy. The bad news is that these simple, straightforward numbers are only used in algebra and accounting.<\/p>\n<p>In normal conversations these simple, straightforward numbers morph into more complicated forms.<\/p>\n<p>But first things first. What you need to remember is that numbers in Polish must agree in gender and case with the nouns that follow them. Yeah, yeah, they decline. And there\u2019s nothing you can do about it.<\/p>\n<p>So, let\u2019s get some examples:<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">masculine personal noun:<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>m\u0119\u017cczyzna<\/strong> \u2013 a man<\/li>\n<li><strong>jeden m\u0119\u017cczyzna<\/strong> \u2013 one man<\/li>\n<li><strong>dwaj m\u0119\u017cczy\u017ani<\/strong> \u2013 two men<\/li>\n<li><strong>trzej m\u0119\u017cczy\u017ani<\/strong> \u2013 three men<\/li>\n<li><strong>czterej m\u0119\u017cczy\u017ani<\/strong> \u2013 four men<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>but:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>pi\u0119ciu m\u0119\u017cczyzn<\/strong> \u2013 five men<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>See what happened with the noun here? Instead staying in Nominative, the case changed to\u2026 yeah, changed to what? It may look like it\u2019s Genitive, but on closer inspection it seems to be Accusative. And to confuse the matters even further, regardless of what it seems, it\u2019s used just like your regular, standard issue Nominative.<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">masculine non-personal noun:<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>pies<\/strong> \u2013 a dog<\/li>\n<li><strong>jeden pies<\/strong>\u2013 one dog<\/li>\n<li><strong>dwa psy<\/strong> \u2013 two dogs<\/li>\n<li><strong>trzy psy<\/strong>\u2013 three dogs<\/li>\n<li><strong>cztery psy<\/strong> \u2013 four dogs<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>but:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>pi\u0119\u0107 ps\u00f3w<\/strong> \u2013 five dogs<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Same thing here. You hit five and stuff happens.<br \/>\nLet\u2019s see how it looks with a feminine noun:<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">feminine noun:<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>kobieta<\/strong> \u2013 a woman<\/li>\n<li><strong>jedna kobieta<\/strong> \u2013 one woman<\/li>\n<li><strong>dwie kobiety<\/strong> \u2013 two women<\/li>\n<li><strong>trzy kobiety<\/strong> \u2013 three women<\/li>\n<li><strong>cztery kobiety<\/strong> \u2013 four women<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>but:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>pi\u0119\u0107 kobiet<\/strong> &#8211; five women<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Woohoo! Here we go again. It\u2019s the number five curse.<\/p>\n<p>And one more left-<br \/>\n<span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">neuter noun:<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>jajko<\/strong> \u2013 an egg<\/li>\n<li><strong>jedno jajko<\/strong> \u2013 one egg<\/li>\n<li><strong>dwa jajka<\/strong> \u2013 two eggs<\/li>\n<li><strong>trzy jajka<\/strong> \u2013 three eggs<\/li>\n<li><strong>cztery jajka<\/strong> \u2013 four eggs<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>but<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>pi\u0119\u0107 jajek<\/strong> \u2013 five eggs<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>However, that\u2019s not exactly totally true when it comes to neuter nouns. <strong>Dziecko<\/strong> (a child) is also a neuter noun. But strange things happen to it when you try to count those kids:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>jedno dziecko<\/strong> \u2013 one child<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>but<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>dwoje dzieci<\/strong> \u2013 two children<\/li>\n<li><strong>troje dzieci<\/strong> \u2013 three children<\/li>\n<li><strong>czworo dzieci<\/strong> \u2013 four children<\/li>\n<li><strong>pi\u0119cioro dzieci<\/strong> \u2013 five children<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>See? Those pesky children \u2013 <strong>dzieci<\/strong> \u2013 stay the same no matter the number.<\/p>\n<p>And what happens when you get to numbers above five? They still follow the same Accusative-like pattern.<\/p>\n<p>And some important grammatical terms:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>liczebnik<\/strong> (<em>masc., pl.<\/em> <strong>liczebniki<\/strong>) \u2013 numeral (number)<\/li>\n<li><strong>liczebnik g\u0142\u00f3wny<\/strong> \u2013 cardinal number<\/li>\n<li><strong>liczebnik porz\u0105dkowy<\/strong> \u2013 ordinal number<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>This post should keep you busy counting various things at least until next week.<br \/>\nI am moving and will be <strong>bez internetu<\/strong> (without internet) until March 11th.<br \/>\nI will try to keep an eye on you and respond to comments from a cybercafe, or somesuch. (That is, if I manage to dig myself out from under all these boxes first!)<\/p>\n<p>In the meantime, take care and <strong>do<\/strong> <strong>zobaczenia wkr\u00f3tce<\/strong> (see you soon)!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The post where I attempted to count priests (is it \u201cdwaj ksi\u0119\u017ca\u201d or \u201cdw\u00f3ch ksi\u0119\u017cy\u201d?) made me realize that we\u2019ve never talked about numbers before. Hmmm\u2026 I wonder why I\u2019ve been avoiding this particular topic. Really, no reason at all. Yeah, right! Ok, in that case, let\u2019s get started. I\u2019m sure that most, if not&hellip;<\/p>\n<p class=\"post-item__readmore\"><a class=\"btn btn--md\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/cardinal-numbers\/\">Continue Reading<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":37,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":""},"categories":[6,13],"tags":[7351,1026,7364,7373,74,110,111],"class_list":["post-491","post","type-post","status-publish","hentry","category-grammar","category-vocabulary","tag-cardinal-numbers","tag-cases","tag-counting","tag-declensions","tag-gender","tag-nouns","tag-numbers"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/491","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/37"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=491"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/491\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=491"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=491"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=491"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}