Czech Nouns

• Nouns - podstatná jména
• Noun


  A word for a living being or thing, including places
• Noun


  Words for processes, qualities, abstract ideas and the like, which we treat (in language, at least) as if they were 'things'
• Gender


  • Czech nouns have a feature of grammar (shared with other European languages, such as German, French and Latin) which we call gender
  • Grammatical gender does partly agree with our English idea of natural gender - men, boys and bulls are 'masculine'; women, girls and milk-bearing cows are 'feminine' - but in Czech, grammatical gender applies to inanimate and abstract nouns as well, and these are not by any means all 'neuter'
  • Czech nouns are divided into three genders, masculine, feminine and neuter (mužský rod, ženský rod, střední rod), but in some situations we have to distinguish between masculine animates (mužský rod životný) and masculine inanimates (mužský rod neživotný)
• Why is this gender classification so important?
• Adjective ending

  When describing a noun with an adjective or adding a word such as 'that' to it, you need to know a noun's gender, because the ending of the adjective is affected by it
• Grammatical cases


  Categorising Czech nouns by gender helps to identify what endings they will use in different grammatical cases
• Basic family terms


  • masculine: otec 'father', syn 'son', bratr 'brother', dědeček 'grandfather', vnuk 'grandson'
  • feminine: matka 'mother', dcera 'daughter', sestra 'sister', babička 'grandmother', vnučka 'grand-daughter' - plus rodina 'family'
• Gender rules


  • Nouns for male persons are normally masculine, e.g. muž 'man', kluk 'boy'
  • Nouns for female persons are normally feminine, e.g. žena 'woman', dívka 'girl'
  • Czech habitually distinguishes gender when labelling people by nationality, occupation etc., where English does not necessarily do so (with exceptions for occupations like 'actor' and 'actress')
  • With some words for animals the gender is clearly specified for us by the meaning, e.g. býk 'bull'
  • Words for the young of animals are usually neuter, e.g. štěně 'puppy', kotě 'kitten'
  • For other kinds of nouns you need to learn the gender as you go along
• Masculine animate nouns


  Masculine animate nouns for human beings are usually deducible from the meaning, although it is also useful to know that their feminine equivalents will usually end in either -ka or -(k)ynĕ
• Masculine animate noun endings

  • consonant, also in -a, much less often -e or even -o, e.g. pán 'master, gentleman', kluk 'boy', bratr 'brother', kamarád 'friend' (compare kamarádka 'female friend'), student 'student' (studentka 'female student'), muž 'man', otec 'father', učitel 'teacher' (učitelka 'female teacher'), předseda 'chairman' (předsedkyně 'chairwoman'), kolega 'colleague' (kolegyně 'female colleague'), soudce 'judge' (soudkyně 'female judge'), Ivo 'the personal name Ivo'
• Determining noun gender


  • Masculine: Most nouns ending in a consonant, e.g. hrad 'castle', kufr 'suitcase', vlak 'train', stroj 'machine', čaj 'tea'

  Feminine: Most nouns ending in -a, -e or the suffix -ost meaning '-ness', e.g. voda 'water', lekce 'lesson', radost 'joy, happiness'

  Neuter: Most nouns ending in -o or -í, e.g. město 'town', auto 'car', stavení 'building', náměstí 'square'
• Plural


  Most nouns have forms for both the singular (singulár, jednotné číslo) and the plural (plurál, množné číslo)
• Plural noun endings


  • Masculine inanimate and feminine nouns: -y, e.g. rohlík – rohlíky 'rolls', deka – deky 'rivers'

  Masculine animate nouns: -i, e.g. kamarád – kamarádi [-d'i] 'friends' (some have plural -ové or -é, e.g. pánové 'men, gentlemen', učitelé 'teachers')

  Neuter nouns in -o: -a, e.g. pivo – piva 'beers'

  Nouns (other than masc. anim.) ending in a 'soft' consonant or -e: -e, e.g. tramvaj – tramvaje 'trams, tramcars', ulice – ulice 'streets', večeře – večeře 'suppers'
• Plural-only nouns


  Some nouns are 'plural-only', often as in English, e.g. kalhoty 'trousers', nůžky 'scissors'. Also (unlike English): noviny 'newspaper', záda 'back'.
• Cases


  Czech nouns change their endings for various purposes, not just for the plural, producing what are called different 'cases'. To go through the various cases of a noun is called to 'decline' it, and the resulting table is a 'declension'.
• Cases


  • nominative, accusative, genitive, dative, locative, instrumental and vocative
• Nominative case


  The basic (dictionary, default) form of a Czech noun, used for the subject, agent, doer of a verb
• Accusative case


  Primarily used for the object of a verb (the recipient of its action or state), also used after certain prepositions
• Genitive case


  Primarily means the same as English 'of', also follows many prepositions
• Dative case


  Primarily means 'to/for', also follows a few prepositions
• Locative case


  Often denotes a fixed location, and is used only after prepositions
• Instrumental case


  Means 'by/with (a means or instrument)', also follows prepositions
• Vocative case


  Used for addressing or calling people
• Hard and soft declensions

  • The main types may be classified as belonging either to a 'hard' pattern (tvrdý vzor) or a 'soft' pattern (měkký vzor)

  'Hard' consonants are d, t, g, h, k, n, r. 'Ambivalent' labials b, p, m, v, liquid l, and sibilants s, z mostly count as 'hard', but not always

  'Soft' consonants are ď, c, ť, ň, ř (diacritic letters), č and j (but c is occasionally 'hard')

  Hard nouns regularly end in a 'hard' or 'ambivalent' consonant, -a, or -o

  Soft nouns regularly end in a 'soft' consonant, -e, -ost or -í
• Genitive case as a marker of declension

  Dictionaries and glossaries have to indicate the genitive case of a noun in order to show its declension type
• Hard and soft declensions
• Hard consonants


  d, t, g, h, k, n, r
• Ambivalent labials

  b, p, m, v, liquid l, and sibilants s, z
• Soft consonants


  a, d', c, d, e, t', f (diacritic letters), c and j (but c is occasionally 'hard')
• Hard nouns


  Regularly end in a 'hard' or 'ambivalent' consonant, -a, or -o
• Soft nouns


  Regularly end in a 'soft' consonant, -e, -ost or -í
• Genitive singular as a marker of declension

  Dictionaries and glossaries habitually give the genitive sg., along with the gender, to mark the declension type
• Typical hard types genitive singular

  • a (masculine animate or neuter), -u (masculine inanimate) or -y (feminine)
• Fleeting -E-


  Many nouns ending in a consonant drop a final -e- syllable when case endings are added
• Vowel shortening


  Sometimes the vowel in the body of a noun undergoes shortening before any case endings
• Hard types


  • Masculine Animate - type PÁN -a 'gentleman, master'
  • Masculine Inanimate - type HRAD -u 'castle'
  • Feminine - type LEN|A -y 'woman, wife'
  • Neuter - type MHST|O -a 'town'
• Soft types


  • Masculine Animate - type MUL -e 'man', type soudc|e -e 'judge'
  • Masculine Inanimate - type STROJ -e 'machine'
  • Feminine - types RQL|E -e 'rose' and PÍ|SEI -snB 'song', type kost -i 'bone'
  • Neuter - type moD|e -e 'sea', type kuD|e -ete 'chicken', type staven|í -í 'building'
• In Czech schools cases are habitually named by number in a particular order
• The order of cases adopted in this grammar is different to harmonise better with English learning habits for other inflected languages such as Russian and Latin