# All Slavic languages: auxiliaries for passive voice



## jazyk

In Polish there are two auxiliaries for the passive voice: zostać and być.

Imperfective actions require the verb być followed by the imperfective past participle: List jest pisany przez mamę.
Perfective actions require the verb zostać followed by the perfective past participle: List był napisany przez mamę.

Czech, Russian, and Macedonian use only one auxiliary (in Czech the participle may be imperfective or perfective, in Russian and Macedonian only perfective).

Czech: Dopis je psán/psaný mámou./Dopis byl napsán/napsaný mámou.
Russian: Письмо написано мамой./Письмо было написано мамой.
Macedonian: Писмото е напишано од мама./Писмото беше напишано од мама.

I know that Slavic languages don't use the passive voice as often as English and my examples would sound better in the active voice, but I'm still interested in knowing what it looks like in your language.


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## sokol

I guess that Polish is the exception here - but I won't give the Slovenian equivalent (where it should be only 'biti' to my knowledge) because I would at least make one error (and probably as many as there are words in the sentence).


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## Athaulf

jazyk said:


> In Polish there are two auxiliaries for the passive voice: zostać and być.
> 
> Imperfective actions require the verb być followed by the imperfective past participle: List jest pisany przez mamę.
> Perfective actions require the verb zostać followed by the perfective past participle: List był napisany przez mamę.



Um... are you sure you don't have a typo in these examples? I never learned Polish, but I would gladly bet $100 that _był_ and _jest_ are past and present forms of the verb _być_, and that _zostać _should look quite different. 



> Czech, Russian, and Macedonian use only one auxiliary (in Czech the participle may be imperfective or perfective, in Russian and Macedonian only perfective).
> 
> Czech: Dopis je psán/psaný mámou./Dopis byl napsán/napsaný mámou.
> Russian: Письмо написано мамой./Письмо было написано мамой.
> Macedonian: Писмото е напишано од мама./Писмото беше напишано од мама.
> 
> I know that Slavic languages don't use the passive voice as often as English and my examples would sound better in the active voice, but I'm still interested in knowing what it looks like in your language.


In BCS, we use only the verb _biti_ "to be" for passive voice. However, passive voice in BCS sounds even more unnatural and its use is even more restricted than in other Slavic languages. We don't even have a natural way of expressing the agent in passive sentences (instrumental is not used for this purpose in BCS). The only general way to do it is to use the conjunction "od strane", which sounds extremely stilted and artificial:

_Pismo je [bilo] [na]pisano od strane mame. _(Not ungrammatical, but sounds ugly as hell.)

To change the prominence of the subject or the object in the sentence, which is the main purpose of passive sentences that include the agent in English, we would simply use a non-SVO word order_, _e.g._ "pismo je napisala mama." 
_


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## jazyk

> Um... are you sure you don't have a typo in these examples? I never learned Polish, but I would gladly bet $100 that _był_ and _jest_ are past and present forms of the verb _być_, and that _zostać _should look quite different.


Oops, of course I have, and a big one. Thanks for catching it. It should read:List został napisany przez mamę.


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## WannaBeMe

In Serbian is passive voice ussed almost equivalent to English or even better to Italian:
For imperfective verbs we use active verb + pronoun se:
The letter is being written - Pismo se piše (La lettera si scrivi)
The letter was being written - Pismo se (je) pisalo. (La lettera si scriveva.)
The letter had been written- Pismo se (je) bilo pisalo. /Pismo se bijaše pisalo.
The letter will have been written- Pismo će se pisati.
If the letter would have been written...- Ako se pismo bude pisalo...
The letter would be written- Pismo bi se pisalo.

Now for perfective verbs we use biti + participle:
The letter is written- Pismo je napisano.
The letter was written- Pismo je bilo napisano. / Pismo bí napisno./ Pismo bijaše napisano.
The letter will be written- Pismo će biti napisano.
The letter would be written- Pismo bi bilo napisano.
If the letter would be written- Ako pismo bude (bilo) napisano.

It is possible to use biti + participle also for imperfective verbs: Pismo je pisano or pismo je bilo pisano or pismo ce biti pisano, etc. 
And it is also possible to say: pismo se napisalo or pismo se bilo napisalo instead of pismo je napisano or pismo je bilo napisano.

So, after all of this I realized it is possible to build the passive voice in both ways.


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## WannaBeMe

Hi, it´s me again 
I forgot to mention that the actor is not really needed  to be mentioned, but if you really want it to you can use instrumental but it sounds arcaic: Isus je rodjen ocem kroz koga je sve postalo.
In some cases you can youse kroz (through): Isus je rodjen kroz oca kroz koga je sve postalo. (but it sounds very ugly)
In most of cases you can use od: Isus je rodjen od oca kroz koga je sve postalo.


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## disparity

Bulgarian uses two ways of forming the passive - one with the help of the reflexive pronoun "се" and the form of the notional verb in the respective tense- Писмото се пишеше (The letter was being written) and the other - with the auxiliary verb "съм" (to be) in the respective tense and the past passive participle of the verb: Писмото е написано (The letter is written).
Bulgarian does not distinguish between perfective and imperfective actions when the second way of forming the passive is used. Thus, you can have
Книгата се търсеше. (Тhe book was being looked for)
Книгата се търси. (The book was looked for), and
Книгата се беше търсила. (The book had been looked for)
(all the three sound extremely unusual to the Bulgarian native speaker, although they are grammatically correct).
But if you want to form the above mentioned examples with the auxiliary verb "съм" (to be) you will only have:
Книгата беше търсена. (The book was looked for)
This expression, however, will be the more acceptable one.


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## Bruno 1234

WannaBeMe said:


> In Serbian is passive voice ussed almost equivalent to English or even better to Italian:
> For imperfective verbs we use active verb + pronoun se:
> The letter is being written - Pismo se piše (La lettera si scrivi)
> The letter was being written - Pismo se (je) pisalo. (La lettera si scriveva.)
> The letter had been written- Pismo se (je) bilo pisalo. /Pismo se bijaše pisalo.
> The letter will have been written- Pismo će se pisati.
> If the letter would have been written...- Ako se pismo bude pisalo...
> The letter would be written- Pismo bi se pisalo.
> 
> Now for perfective verbs we use biti + participle:
> The letter is written- Pismo je napisano.
> The letter was written- Pismo je bilo napisano. / Pismo bí napisno./ Pismo bijaše napisano.
> The letter will be written- Pismo će biti napisano.
> The letter would be written- Pismo bi bilo napisano.
> If the letter would be written- Ako pismo bude (bilo) napisano.
> 
> It is possible to use biti + participle also for imperfective verbs: Pismo je pisano or pismo je bilo pisano or pismo ce biti pisano, etc.
> And it is also possible to say: pismo se napisalo or pismo se bilo napisalo instead of pismo je napisano or pismo je bilo napisano.
> 
> So, after all of this I realized it is possible to build the passive voice in both ways.




Could you complete the sentences and commentaries about perfective/imperfective verbs WITH COMPLETE PASSIVE SENTENCES (as a "passive sentence" is understtod among Latin languages = Subject+passive verb+Complement of agent)?

The letter is written by Mary  (la lettera è scritta da Maria, la lettre est écrite par Marie, la carta es escrita por María)
The letter is being written by Mary (la lettera sta essendo scritta da Maria, la lettre est en train d'être écrite par Marie, la carta está siendo escrita por María) 
The letter was written by Mary (la lettera è stata scritta/fu scritta da Maria, la lettre a été écrite par Marie, la carta fue escrita por María)
The letter shall be written by Mary (la lettera sarà scritta da Maria, la lettre va être écrite par Marie, la carta será escrita por María)

Velika hvala.


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## Duya

Technically, I could provide an answer, but I'll just requote Athaulf:



Athaulf said:


> In BCS, we use only the verb _biti_ "to be" for passive voice. However, passive voice in BCS sounds even more unnatural and its use is even more restricted than in other Slavic languages. We don't even have a natural way of expressing the agent in passive sentences (instrumental is not used for this purpose in BCS). The only general way to do it is to use the conjunction "od strane", which sounds extremely stilted and artificial:
> 
> _Pismo je [bilo] [na]pisano od strane mame. _(Not ungrammatical, but sounds ugly as hell.)
> 
> To change the prominence of the subject or the object in the sentence, which is the main purpose of passive sentences that include the agent in English, we would simply use a non-SVO word order_, _e.g._ "pismo je napisala mama."
> _



So, please just... don't. There's no way the literal translation of your sentences could be naturally uttered by a native speaker. We just don't mention agent in passive sentences.


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## VelikiMag

> _Pismo je [bilo] [na]pisano od strane mame. _(Not ungrammatical, but sounds ugly as hell.)


This one indeed sounds bad, but not all such sentences do. For example, one can say:
_Pismo je potpisano od strane predsjednika._
_Ugovor je ovjeren od strane ovlašćenog lica.
Izjava je uzeta od strane policije.
_These sentences however sound official. In administration and legal business you can find plenty of them.

Sometimes a passive construction is as good as its active counterpart:
_Film je odlično prihvaćen od strane publike = Publika je odlično prihvatila film._

I wouldn't say that passive voice is unnatural in BCS, but it is definitely something one should be careful with.


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## Bruno 1234

I wouldn't say that passive voice is unnatural in BCS, but it is definitely something one should be careful with.[/QUOTE]

I agree with you when you point out the lack of "naturality" in these kind of sentences: even in Latin languages and in English,  very rarely we can hear "the mouse is eaten by thel cat" instead of "the cat eats the mouse". That's true.

Anyway, there are sentences in which the attention is focused on the subject that undergoes the action of the verb, like these (I've just translated them into English: I picked them in today's Spanish papers):

Penicilline was discovered by Dr. Fleming.

Ananas is imported by most of European countries.

The square has been inaugurated by the King in Mostar.

The bridge was destroyed by the troops in retreat.

Obama was elected president by a vast majority of Americans.

Mendoza was captured by Interpol in the airport.


So, is  it possible to keep this passive construction in colloquial Serbian/Croatian? 

Which ones would be the equivalent sentences that we could see written in Blic, in Večernji List, in Dan or in Montenegro Family? 

Velika hvala.


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## Duya

For all those cases, we prefer either active construction with reversed word order, to keep the focus on the patient, or a reflexive impersonal construction (Spanish has similar one as far as I know, although it is more ubiquitous in BCS). In the latter, the agent is also avoided:

Penicilline was discovered by Dr. Fleming.
_Penicilin je otkrio dr Fleming._

Ananas is imported by most of European countries.
_Većina evropskih zemalja uvozi ananas__._
_Ananas__ se uvozi u v__ećini evropskih zemalja__._ (_se uvozi_=impersonal reflexive, but then _u većini zemalja_ becomes a locational phrase, not an agent)

The square has been inaugurated by the King in Mostar.
_ Trg je u Mostaru otvorio kralj_.

The bridge was destroyed by the troops in retreat.
_ Most su uništile trupe u povlačenju.
_
Obama was elected president by a vast majority of Americans.
_ Obamu je za predsednika izabrala velika većina Amerikanaca._
_Obama je izabran za predsednika velikom većinom glasova Amerikanaca._ (true passive;_ velikom većinom_ _glasova_=instrumental, making an adverbial phrase or an indirect object, depending on how you analyse it)

Mendoza was captured by Interpol in the airport.
_Mendozu je Interpol uhvatio na aerodromu._


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## Bruno 1234

Duya said:


> For all those cases, we prefer either active construction with reversed word order, to keep the focus on the patient, or a reflexive impersonal construction (Spanish has similar one as far as I know, although it is more ubiquitous in BCS). In the latter, the agent is also avoided:
> 
> Penicilline was discovered by Dr. Fleming.
> _Penicilin je otkrio dr Fleming._
> 
> Ananas is imported by most of European countries.
> _Većina evropskih zemalja uvozi ananas__._
> _Ananas__ se uvozi u v__ećini evropskih zemalja__._ (_se uvozi_=impersonal reflexive, but then _u većini zemalja_ becomes a locational phrase, not an agent)
> 
> The square has been inaugurated by the King in Mostar.
> _ Trg je u Mostaru otvorio kralj_.
> 
> The bridge was destroyed by the troops in retreat.
> _ Most su uništile trupe u povlačenju.
> _
> Obama was elected president by a vast majority of Americans.
> _ Obamu je za predsednika izabrala velika većina Amerikanaca._
> _Obama je izabran za predsednika velikom većinom glasova Amerikanaca._ (true passive;_ velikom većinom_ _glasova_=instrumental, making an adverbial phrase or an indirect object, depending on how you analyse it)
> 
> Mendoza was captured by Interpol in the airport.
> _Mendozu je Interpol uhvatio na aerodromu._




Thank you for your commentaries, Duya.

And yes, you are right about Spanish impersonal construction. Instead of of "América fue descubierta en 1492" (America was discovered in 1492), we usually say "América se descubrió en 1492" ("someone" discovered America in 1492): and these constructions lack of agent.


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## Duya

In BCS, we would typically use passive for perfective verbs that have a human agent, but who is irrelevant:Amerika je otkrivena 1497. (not *se otkrila) Impersonal is more for imperfective aspect, or where agent is unindentifiable (eng. 'one', fr. 'il'):U Americi se dobro živi.Often, you have a choice:Grad je zidan/se zidao stotinama godina.


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