Lesson 47. Nominative Singular: Three Genders

The nominative is the simplest case. It matches the form you see in the dictionary. Today we’ll look at the endings again and practice recognizing nominative in sentences.

Nominative Singular Endings

Nominative Case, Singular

	Gender	Ending
masculine	-∅ (consonant)	brat, grad, hleb, konj
feminine	-a	mama, sestra, kuća
neuter	-o / -e	selo, more

Role in a Sentence: Subject

The nominative almost always appears as the subject — it shows who or what is doing the action.

Brat čita knjigu. (Брат чита књигу.)

— The brother reads a book. (who reads? — `brat`, nominative)

Sestra peva. (Сестра пева.)

— The sister sings.

More je plavo. (Море је плаво.)

— The sea is blue.

Nominative as Predicate

Another place where nominative appears is after biti (“to be”):

Moj brat je student. (Мој брат је студент.)

— My brother is a student.

Ovo je moja kuća. (Ово је моја кућа.)

— This is my house.

Both words (moj brat and student) are in the nominative.

Nominative vs. Accusative

With feminine words ending in -a, the difference is visible:

Mama čita. (Мама чита.)

— Mother reads. (nominative)

Vidim mamu. (Видим маму.)

— I see mother. (accusative)

With masculine inanimate nouns — they are the same:

Sto je velik. (Сто је велик.)

— The table is big. (nominative)

Vidim sto. (Видим сто.)

— I see the table. (accusative = nominative)

But animate masculine nouns are different:

Brat čita. (Брат чита.)

— Brother reads. (nominative)

Vidim brata. (Видим брата.)

— I see brother. (accusative, +a)

Exercises

Exercise 1

In which sentence is `knjiga` in the nominative?

Show explanation

It’s nominative when the word acts or is described: Knjiga je moja.

Exercise 2

In the sentence «Volim more», what case is `more`?

Show explanation

“I love what?” → the sea. Accusative. With neuter nouns, nominative and accusative look the same (more), but the role is different.

Exercise 3

Find the nominative in these sentences: — Sestra peva pesmu. — Ovo je moj pas. — Deca vole sladoled.

Show answer

— sestra (who sings?) — ovo, moj pas (both nominative; what is this; what is a home) — deca (who loves?). sladoled here is accusative.

Exercise 4

Make up one sentence with nominative for each gender.

Show answer

For example: — Grad je velik. (masculine) — Mama je dobra. (feminine) — More je plavo. (neuter)

Exercise 5

Why is the nominative called the “base form” of a word?

Show answer

Because it’s the form you see in the dictionary and where you start learning a word.

Lesson vocabulary

pesma песма: song
podmet подмет: subject

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