Learn how to use Czech adjectives
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| Ahoj, já jsem Veronika. Hi everybody! I am Veronika. |
| Welcome to CzechClass101.com’s “Česky za 3 minuty”. The fastest, easiest, and most fun way to learn Czech. |
| In the last lesson, you learned how to use the verb mít, meaning "to have," in the negative form. |
| In this lesson, we will start to learn about Czech adjectives and how to use them properly. |
| You will see that for adjectives, things in Czech are not as simple as in English. |
| The basic rule for using adjectives correctly in Czech is that adjectives always have to agree with their subject. |
| Let’s start with a concrete example: |
| Je to nový dům. means "It’s a new house" |
| [slowly] : Je to nový dům. Dům is a masculine word and here the adjective is nový meaning “new”. |
| Let’s see the same sentence with a feminine subject. It becomes: Je to nová kniha. meaning "It’s a new book." |
| Here the adjective loses its -ý and an -á is added instead, so it becomes nová. |
| [slowly]:Je to nová kniha. |
| If the subject is a neuter noun, the adjective also changes: |
| Je to nové auto. means "It is a new car." |
| Here the subject auto is a neutral singular word, so the adjective nové is also in the neutral singular form. |
| [slowly] Je to nové auto. |
| In Czech the form of the adjective also changes when the structure of the sentence has changed. |
| It is also correct to say... |
| Dům je nový. |
| Kniha je nová. |
| Auto je nové. |
| Here are a few more examples to show the difference between masculine, feminine and neutral form. |
| Přátelský is the masculine for "nice" or "kind", whereas |
| přátelská is the feminine and |
| přátelské the neutral form. |
| Hezký is the masculine for "nice" or "beautiful", whereas |
| hezká is the feminine and |
| hezké is the neutral one. |
| Horký is the masculine for "hot", whereas horká is the feminine and |
| horké the neutral. |
| Dobrý is the masculine for "delicious", whereas dobrá is the feminine and |
| dobré the neutral. |
| Now let’s find out how to switch an adjective from singular to plural. There are different plural forms for masculine animate, masculine inanimate, feminine and neuter nouns. |
| For example, Jsou to noví studenti means “They are new students.” So for masculine animate nouns in nominative, you should use the form noví. |
| Jsou to noví studenti. |
| [slowly] Jsou to noví studenti. |
| For masculine inanimate nouns and feminine nouns the plural form is nové: |
| “They are new computers.”, for example, is... |
| Jsou to nové počítače. |
| [slowly]Jsou to nové počítače. And |
| “They are new female students.” is... |
| Jsou to nové studentky. |
| [slowly] Jsou to nové studentky. |
| For neuter nouns the plural form is nová. So |
| “They are new cars.” is... |
| Jsou to nová auta. |
| [slowly] Jsou to nová auta. |
| As you may already know, you can also change the word order: |
| Studenti jsou noví. |
| Počítače jsou nové. |
| Studentky jsou nové. |
| Auta jsou nová. |
| Most of the adjectives in Czech are like the ones I described earlier. But there is another group that ends with -í. These adjectives are very easy, because they stay the same for all the variants of masculine, feminine and neuter in the nominative: |
| Examples are as follows: “Salad” is a masculine noun in Czech, so “spring salad” is jarní salát. |
| [slowly] jarní salát |
| A feminine noun is “flower”: jarní květina is “spring flower” |
| [slowly] jarní květina |
| and neuter is jarní ovoce or “spring fruit” |
| [slowly] jarní ovoce |
| All the forms in plural are also the same, jarní. |
| Now it’s time for Veronika’s Insights. |
| If you want to insist on an adjective in Czech, you can use the word moc before the adjective, as in moc hezký, which is "very beautiful" or moc dobrý which is "really delicious." |
| In this lesson, you learned how to properly use adjectives in Czech and how to agree them correctly with nouns. |
| Next time you’ll learn the basic uses of verbs jet and jít, which mean "to go", so that you will be able to say sentences like "I’m going to school." |
| I’ll be waiting for you in the next Česky za 3 minuty lesson. |
| Ahoj! |
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