# Slovenian: word endings



## Alberta

I know in Slovenian there is singular, dual and plurial.
For words finishing by a consonant like:
Kozarec=1 kozarca=2 kozarce=3 and more

What is the grammar rule for this kind of words?

For words endding by voyels like:
mu^sica=1 mu^sici=2 mu^sice=3 and more

So if I have a wors like jajce endding by a "e" what it will be for 
1= jajce 2=jajci??? 3 and more= ???????????????

Also if I'm telling someone I need 2 glasses ,
Do i say ....... dve kozarca..... or you simply don't have to say how many because "kozarca" already means 2 ?

Hvala


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## skye

Kozarec should be: kozarec=1, kozarca=2, kozarci=3

1=jajce, 2=jajci, 3=jajca

I usually say dva kozarca. (dva for masculine nouns and dve for feminine and neutral nouns) You don't always have to use the numeral two, but in this sentence it sounds more natural. 

There is this site which helps you decline the nouns in Slovenian. You can find it here:

http://besana.amebis.si/pregibanje/

You can apparently type in any form of the word (singular, dual, plural, nominative, genitive, etc.). Since you don't have č,š,ž use the same symbol that you do now.


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## skye

Don't know if you've come across this already or not.

The endings depend on which declension the noun belongs to. There are masculine, feminine and neutral, which are then further divided into 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th. There are few differences between some of them.


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## Alberta

Ok its seems really difficult. What is the difference between 
občno ime           and         prebivalec ?

Can you give me an exemple ( a sentence) with every declination. 
-imenovalnik
-rodilnik
-dajalnik
-tožilnik
-mestnik
-orodnik

And in wich circonstence we use those declination.


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## skye

1. Ok, I'll try to explain what občno ime is. It's a name that you give to a group of objects, animals, etc. It defines a group or a species and not an individual.

The name of an individual, a specific town, etc. is lastno ime. 

2. The use of declensions doesn't depend on circumstances. Every noun belongs to a certain declension just like some verbs in English are regular and some irregular. You can't really say why. 

3. There are some guidelines, e.g.:

The nouns which belong to the first feminine declension usually end in -a. (But so do the nouns which belong to the second masculine.)

The nouns which belong to the first masculine declension usually end in a consonant. (But so do nouns that belong to the second feminine declension.)

The nouns which belong to the first neutral declension usually end in -e or -o.

4. It's been a while, since I had Slovene classes, but I think there are 11 declensions altogether. The fourth declension is for adjectives that are used as nouns. I think that the fourth feminine is identical to the first feminine, which is for nouns. 

5. Some terminology, since I'm not sure you know what all these mean:

the six cases used in Slovene:
imenovalnik - nominative
rodilnik - genitive
dajalnik - dative
tožilnik - accusative
mestnik - locative
orodnik - instrumental

the names of grammatical numbers in Slovene:
ednina - singular
dvojina - dual
množina - plural

6. I'll only give you the singular nominative forms and now that you have that link above you only have to type in these words in the field on the first page and you'll get all the forms in all the cases and all the numbers. 

*Perhaps someone else can help me out with the examples because I don't remember all of them any more. *

1st masculine: korak (masculine nouns in a consonant)
2nd masculine: vojvoda (masculine nouns in -a)
3rd masculine: -
4th masculine: dežurni (adjectives used as nouns)

1st feminine: miza (feminine nouns in -a)
2nd feminine: miš (feminine nouns not ending in -a)
3rd feminine: -
4th feminine: dežurna (adjectives used as nouns)

1st neutral: mesto (neutral nouns in -e or -o)
2nd neutral: -
3rd neutral: -
4th neutral: belo (adjectives used as nouns)

One of the missing four doesn't exist (I think it's the second neutral), but I'm not sure which one, I hope others can help with that. 

That's all from me for now.


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## skye

Don't know if you saw it, but only the fourth feminine declension is equal to the first feminine. 

*Don't worry too much about all this though, it's just different endings.* If you're at a beginner level, it's probably a bit too much to learn all at once, but if you're somewhere at the intermediate level you were perhaps wondering how does one know which ending to use. 

I'd say you stick to the nominative if you're only beginning to learn or learn the singular only if you already know the nominative well. I think it's best to learn things one at a time.


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## skye

And declination should be declension. :embarrassed:

Tell you what - you say which level you are at - and I'll give you a couple of words to practise either the nominative or the singular or the rest. If you agree. 

And I promise to check them before I post. (Usually I just use my native speaker language knowledge.)


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## janecito

Wow, skye, you've done an amazing job in this thread.

Just to complete your scheme (I must admit I had to get some help from my/our dear friend Jože T. here)

1st masculine: korak (masculine nouns in a consonant)
2nd masculine: vojvoda (masculine nouns in -a)
* 3rd masculine: A, TAM, ipd. (these are words that have a "zero ending" in all cases - mostly abbreviations, names of letters [veliki A, velikega A etc.] etc.)*
4th masculine: dežurni (adjectives used as nouns)

1st feminine: miza (feminine nouns in -a)
2nd feminine: miš (feminine nouns not ending in -a)
* 3rd feminine: again, these are nouns that do not change in form when declinated - mostly personal names ending in consonant (Karmen) or -i (Fani, Beti, Mary ...), also "mami"*
4th feminine: dežurna (adjectives used as nouns)

1st neutral: mesto (neutral nouns in -e or -o)
* 2nd neutral: does not exist
3rd neutral: this one exists but it is so rare, that I don't know if it is even worth mentioning ... (e.g. "domá" in "ljubo domá, ljubega domá")*
4th neutral: belo (adjectives used as nouns)

Anyway, Alberta, if you are learning Slovene, I would suggest you concentrate on the following four declinations

— masculine ending in consonant (1st masc.)
— feminine ending in -a (1st fem)
— feminine ending in consonant (2nd fem.)
— neuter ending in -o/-e (1st neut.)

Masculine ending in -a (2nd masc) have exactly the same ending as feminine ending in -a (1st fem).
All three 3rd declinations are very seldom used.
All 4th declinations have the same endings as adjectives (basically they are adjectives used as nouns).


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## trance0

I would like to point out, that 4th feminine declension(adjectives used as nouns) does NOT have the same endings as the first feminine declension. It has the same endings in all cases in the singular, but not in the plural and the dual.

Example:

1st feminine declension:

  singular plural          dual

1.  lip*a*               lip*e*             lip*i*
2.  lip*e*               lip               =plural​ 3.  lip*i*                lip*am*           lip*ama*
4.  lip*o*               lip*e*             lip*i*
5.  o lip*i*           o lip*ah*           =plural
6.  z lip*o*          z lip*ami*        z lip*ama*


4th feminine declension:

1.    dežurn*a*        dežurn*e*         dežurn*i*
2.    dežurn*e*        dežurn*ih*        =plural
3.    dežurn*i           *dežurn*im         *dežurn*ima*
4.    dežurn*o*        dežurn*e           *dežurn*i*
5.  o dežurn*i*       o dežurn*ih*       =plural
6.  z dežurn*o*      z dežurn*imi*    z dežurn*ima*


As you can see there are differences in the plural and dual in most cases.


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