Slovene grammar - Part 1
(There is an interactive widget at the end of this post showing how to conjugate a few verbs: jump to the widget)
A short introduction to Slovenian grammar
Learning Slovenian is definitely not a piece of cake, especially if your native language is not a Slavic language.
Declensions are definitively the number 1 reason why learning Slovene is difficult. Whenever you use a noun in your sentence, you have to consider the gender (which English does not), the number (which English only does for the 3rd person singular in the present tense) and… the “role” of your noun in the sentence, also referred as case (or skloni).
The first two parameters are enough to make Slovenian relatively complex because there are three different genders (female, male and neutral) as well as three different numbers (singular, plural and… dual). But the third parameter is definitely a big thing: there are six different cases! Altogether, these variations sum up to 3 * 3 * 6 = 56 possible forms for each noun. In practise, several of these forms are very similar and can be learnt together.
So let’s start with easier parts of the Slovenian grammar: the verbs and three basic tenses, the past, the present and the future.
Present
For the present tense, the ending of the verb only depends on the number of the subject of the verb. You need to add the following endings to the stem of the verb. Here is an example for the verb imeti, meaning to have. Note that there is no ending at the 3rd person singular.
| Singular | Dual | Plural | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1st person | -m Imam (I have) |
-va Imava (we both have) |
-mo Imamo (we have) |
| 2nd person | -š Imaš (You have) |
-ta Imata (you both have) |
-te Imate (You have) |
| 3rd person | - Ima (S/he has) |
-ta Imata (they both have) |
-jo Imajo (They have) |
The vowel before the endings (in italics in the example) depends on the infinitive form of the verb:
- some verbs with an infinitive ending in “-iti” have a “i” before the ending. For example the verb govoriti, to speak: govorim, govoriš, govori, etc…
- some verbs with an infinitive ending in “-ati” have a “a” before the ending. For example the verb gledati, to watch: gledam, gledaš, gleda, etc…
Unfortunately, plenty of verbs with an infinitive ending in “-iti” do not have “i” as a main vowel, and plenty of verbs with an infinitive ending in “-ati” do not have “a” as a main vowel. It means that you need to know at least one form of the verb at the present tense. For example, the verb to write, which is pisati, goes like this: pišem, pišeš, piše, piševa, pišeta, etc. and not like “pisam, pisaš”, etc.
Some verbs also have different forms depending on the person: in that case, you need to know (almost) all them. For example, the verb to eat translates to jesti and the 1st person singular is jem (I eat). Almost all the forms follow the rules: jem (I eat), ješ (you eat), je (s/he eats), jemo (we eat), jejo (they eat) but it is jesta (you both eat / they both eat) and jeste (you eat), with an additionnal s in between the vowel and the ending.
In conclusion, when you learn a new verb, you must learn (at least) one of its form at the present tense.
Past & Future
The past and future tenses are very similar so I’ll present them together:
- To conjugate a verb in the past, you must use the present form of the verb to be + the participle of the verb. The verb to be at the present tense is: sem (I am), si (you are), je (s/he is), sva (we both are), sta (you both are), sta (they both are), smo (we are), ste (you are), so (they are).
For example, if I am a woman, I knew translates to Jaz sem vedela and they knew translates to oni so vedeli.
- To conjugate a verb in the future, you must use the future form of the verb to be + the participle of the verb. The verb to be at the future tense is: bom (I will be), boš (you will be), bo (s/he will be), bova (we will both be), bosta (you will both be), bosta (they will both be), bomo (we will be), boste (you will be), bodo (they will be).
For example, I will see translates to Jaz bom videla (if I am a woman) and to Jaz bom videl (if I am a man). They will see translates to Oni bodo videli.
For the verb to be (biti), we do not use the participle (bil(a/i/o/e)) and the future form: therefore we do not say “Jaz bom bila” but Jaz bom (although some people do use both forms).
Participle
How do you know the participle of the verb? For regular verbs, if you know one present form of the verb, you just need to replace the ending by -l, -la, -lo, -li or -le (I explain the differences between these forms just after). For example, the verb to watch is gledati. In the present tense, we saw it was gledam, gledaš, gleda, …. Therefore the participle of gledati is gledal(a/o/i/e).
But there is also plenty of verbs where the participle cannot be infered from the present form. For example the verb to stay, which is stati, has an irregular present form (stojim, stojiš, …) but a regular participle: stal, stala, …
In conclusion, when you learn a new verb, you must learn its present form AND its participle.
What are these -l, -la, -lo, -li or -le?
When you use the past or future tense, you must know the number and the gender of the subject of the verb, as shown in the following table.
| Singular | Dual | Plural |
|---|---|---|
| Male: -l | At least one male noun: -la | At least one male noun: -li |
| Female: -la | 2 female nouns: -li | Female nouns only: -le |
| Neutral: -lo | 2 neutral nouns: -li | Neutral nouns only: -la |
Interactive verbs
Here is a tiny widget to play with the verbs. You can select a verb among the list and switch between the tenses (past, present and future) as well as choose one specific number and gender.
I focused on two important verbs (to be and to have), two regular verbs (to work and to speak) and four irregular verbs (to go, to eat, to sleep, to live).
Not all of these verbs go with all kind of nouns, hence the restricted number of sentences for the neutral category.