The grammar of the Polish language is characterized by a high degree of inflection, and has relatively free word order, although the dominant arrangement is subject–verb–object (SVO). Polish lacks articles (although this has been a subject of academic debate), and there is frequent dropping of subject pronouns. Distinctive features include the different treatment of masculine personal nouns in the plural, and the complex grammar of numerals and quantifiers.
Regular morphological alternation
Certain regular or common alternations apply across the Polish inflectional system, affecting the morphology of nouns, adjectives, verbs, and other parts of speech. Some of these result from the restricted distribution of the vowels i and y, and from the voicing rules for consonants in clusters and at the end of words. Otherwise, the main changes are the following: vowel alternations, arising from the historical development of certain vowels, which cause vowel changes in some words depending on whether the syllable is closed or open, or whether the following consonant is soft or hard; consonant changes caused by certain endings (such as the -ie of the locative case, and the -i of the masculine personal plural), which historically entailed palatalization of the preceding consonant, and now produce a number of different changes depending on which consonant is involved.
Nouns
Polish retains the Old Slavic system of cases for nouns, pronouns, and adjectives. There are seven cases: nominative , genitive , dative , accusative , instrumental , locative , and vocative .
Number Polish has two number classes: singular and plural.
It used to also have the dual number, but it vanished around the 15th century. It survived only in a few relicts:
body parts that naturally come in pairs have synchronically irregular plural and other forms ("eye") – pl. , genitive plural , instrumental plural regular or irregular ; but not in the sense of "drop of fat on a liquid", which is declined regularly ("hand, arm") – pl. , locative singular regular or irregular , instrumental plural regular or irregular ("ear") – pl. , genitive plural , instrumental plural regular or irregular ; but not in the sense of "a handle (of a jug or a kettle, etc.)", which is declined regularly certain proverbs, e.g. (lit. "two words are enough for a wise head"), with dual (modern )
Gender
For true nouns (not for adjectives), there are three cases that always have the same ending in the plural, regardless of gender or declension class: dative plural in , instrumental plural in or , and locative plural in ; the only apparent exception being nouns that are in fact inflected as previously dual nouns, ex. instrumental plural of "hand".
Inflection There are three main genders (rodzaje): masculine (męski), feminine (żeński) and neuter (nijaki). Masculine nouns are further divided into personal (męskoosobowy), animate (męskożywotny), and inanimate (męskorzeczowy) categories. Personal and animate nouns are distinguished from inanimate nouns in the accusative singular; for the latter the accusative is identical to the nominative. In the plural, the masculine personal nouns are distinguished from all others, which collapse into one non-masculine personal gender (niemęskoosobowy).
The following tables show this distinction using as examples the nouns mężczyzna 'man' (masc. personal), pies 'dog' (masc. animate), stół 'table' (masc. inanimate), kobieta 'woman' (feminine), okno 'window' (neuter). The following table presents examples of how a determiner ten/ta/to ("this") agrees with nouns of different genders in the nominative and the accusative, both singular and plural. Adjectives inflect similarly to this determiner. +singularpluralnom.acc.nom.acc.masculinepersonalten mężczyzna ten pies
ten stółtego mężczyznę tego psaci mężczyźnitych mężczyznanimatete psy te stoły
te kobiety
te oknainanimateten stółfeminineta kobietatę kobietęneuterto okno For verbs, the distinction is only important for past forms in the plural, as in the table below: singularpluralmasculinepersonalmężczyzna biegał pies biegał
stół biegałmężczyźni biegalianimatepsy biegały stoły biegały
kobiety biegały
okna biegałyinanimatefemininekobieta biegałaneuterokno biegało The numeral dwa ("two"), on the other hand, behaves differently, merging masculine non-personal with neuter, but not with feminine: pluralnom.acc.masculinepersonaldwaj mężczyźnidwóch mężczyznanimatedwa psy dwa stoły
dwa oknainanimateneuterfemininedwie kobiety
Morphological endings Gender can usually be inferred from the ending of a noun.
Masculine: masculine nouns typically end in a consonant some nouns, describing people, end in -a, specifically: all nouns ending in -sta, equivalent to English "-ist", e.g. artysta ("artist"), kapitalista ("capitalist"), konserwatysta ("conservative"), socjalista ("socialist") all nouns ending in -nauta, equivalent to English "-naut", e.g. argonauta ("argonaut"), astronauta ("astronaut"), kosmonauta ("cosmonaut") last names first names Barnaba, Bonawentura, also Kuba (diminutive of Jakub) emotionally charged nicknames, e.g. beksa ("crybaby"), łamaga, niezdara, oferma (all three of which mean "a clumsy person") some other nouns, e.g. satelita ("satellite"), wojewoda ("voivode"); hrabia ("count") and sędzia ("judge") – both partially declined like adjectives the nouns liść ("leaf"), teść ("father-in-law"), kostium ("costume"), and album ("album") some personal names end in -o, e.g. Horeszko, Kościuszko; those decline in singular like feminine nouns ending in -a some nouns, which were originally adjectives, end in -i and -y; those decline in singular like adjectives Polish male names ending with -y or -i, e.g. Jerzy, Antoni; they decline like adjectives male names from other languages ending with the sound /i/, e.g. Toby, Lenny; they decline like adjectives Feminine: feminine nouns typically end in -a some nouns end in a soft or hardened consonant: all abstract nouns ending in -ść, e.g. miłość ("love"), nieśmiałość ("shyness"), zawiść ("envy"), etc. almost all concrete nouns ending in -ść: kiść ("bunch"), kość ("bone"), maść ("ointment"), ość ("fishbone"), przepaść ("chasm"), wieść ("news") -b: głąb ("depth") -c: moc ("power"), noc ("night"), pomoc ("help"), przemoc ("violence"), równonoc ("equinox"), Wielkanoc ("Easter"), wszechmoc ("omnipotence") -cz: Bydgoszcz, ciecz ("liquid"), dzicz ("wilderness"), klacz ("mare"), kokorycz ("corydalis"), rzecz ("thing"), smycz ("leash") -ć: brać ("company"), chuć ("lust"), jać ("yat"), mać (archaic for "mother"), płeć ("sex, gender"), sieć ("net") -dź: czeladź (a collective term for servants of one master during the Middle Ages(pl)"), gołoledź ("black ice"), krawędź ("edge"), łódź ("boat"), miedź ("copper"), odpowiedź ("answer"), powódź ("flood"), spowiedź ("confession"), wypowiedź ("utterance"), zapowiedź ("announcement") -j: kolej ("railway") -l: kąpiel ("bath"), myśl ("thought"), sól ("salt") -ń: baśń ("fable"), czerń ("the colour black, blackness"), czerwień ("the colour red, redness"), dłoń ("palm"), goleń ("shin"), jaźń ("self, ego"), jesień ("autumn"), kieszeń ("pocket"), krtań ("larynx"), otchłań ("abyss"), pieczeń ("roasted meat"), pieśń ("song"), pleśń ("mould"), przestrzeń ("space"), przyjaźń ("friendship"), przystań ("haven"), skroń ("temple"), waśń ("feud"), woń ("odour"), zieleń ("the colour green, greenness") -p: Gołdap -rz: macierz ("matrix"), twarz ("face") -sz: mysz ("mouse"), wesz ("louse") -ś: Białoruś ("Belarus"), gęś ("goose"), oś ("axis"), pierś ("breast"), Ruś ("Ruthenia"), wieś ("village") -ź: gałąź ("branch"), rzeź ("slaughter") -ż: grabież ("pillage"), młodzież ("youth"), odzież ("clothing"), podaż ("supply"), sprzedaż ("sale"), straż ("guard"), uprząż ("harness") -w: brew ("eyebrow"), brukiew ("rutabaga"), marchew ("carrot"), konew ("jug"), krew ("blood"), rukiew ("watercress"), rzodkiew ("radish"), żagiew ("torch") words ending in -ini are feminine, e.g. bogini ("goddess"); also pani ("Mrs") feminine last names ending in a consonant are invariable Neuter: neuter nouns typically end in -o verbal nouns, which are always neuter, end in -e, e.g. jedzenie, śpiewanie, etc. diminutives ending in -ę are always neuter, e.g. źrebię ("foal"), dziecię ("child") Latin loanwords ending in -um : invariable in the singular, declinable in the plural by removing the -um ending and replacing it by neuter plural endings; the genitive plural is in -ów contrary to other neuters that have no ending → muzeum, muzea (N. pl.), muzeów (G. pl.) loanwords ending in -i are neuter and invariable, e.g. kiwi, Brunei, Burundi acronyms ending in a vowel (in pronunciation), e.g. BMW ; if an acronym is native, its gender may also be equal to the gender of the noun in the full version of the acronym
Semantic membership The distinction between personal, animate and inanimate nouns within masculine nouns is largely semantic, although not always.
Personal nouns are comprised by human nouns such as mężczyzna 'man' or sędzia 'male judge', personal names of men, as well as the noun bóg 'male god' and proper names of male gods (e.g. Rod "Rod", Jowisz "Jupiter").
Animate nouns are largely comprised by animals such as pies ("dog") or pawian ("baboon"), many members from other life domains, as well as a number of objects associated with human activity. On the morphological level however, such nouns are only partially similar to animate nouns, having their accusative identical to their genitive only in the singular. Some examples :
names of fruit, e.g. ananas ("pineapple"), banan ("banana") names of fungi, bacteria, viruses, e.g. borowik ("cep"), grzyb ("mushroom"), wirus ("virus"), gronkowiec ("staphylococcus") names of consumer goods and brands, e.g. mercedes ("Mercedes car"), Nikon (as in Mam Nikona – "I have a Nikon"), papieros ("cigarette") names of currency, e.g. dolar ("dollar"), funt ("pound") names of dances, e.g. polonez ("polonaise") some loanwords related to information technology, e.g. blog, komputer ("computer") nouns related to human or human-like referents, e.g. nieboszczyk, trup (both of which mean "corpse"), robot ("robot"), wisielec ("the body of a hanged person"), duch ("ghost")
Contrary to fungi and bacteria, most plant names of masculine gender are inanimate, e.g. żonkil ("daffodil"), hiacynt ("hyacinth"), dąb ("oak"), cis ("yew tree"), which are all inanimate. The noun goździk ("carnation") is an exception as a masculine animate. Not all technological loanwords are animate either, e.g. inanimate modem, telefon ("telephone, cellphone"), and tranzystor ("transistor"). Robot can be treated as animate or inanimate.
It is common for personal masculine nouns to change gender to inanimate to create semantic neologisms, for example edytor ("editor", pl. ci edytorzy) and edytor (tekstu) ("word processor software", pl. te edytory).
For non-living objects that represent humans (e.g. in games), personal masculine nouns usually change gender to animate; for example, the word król ("king"), which is masculine-personal when referring to a monarch (pl. ci królowie), becomes masculine-animate when referring to the playing card or the chess piece (pl. te króle).
There are also a few pairs of homographs that completely change their meaning depending on their gender. Examples are:
Homographs that differ only by their gender can also occur in some Polish place names; for example, the town of Ostrów (Wielkopolski) is masculine, while the town of Ostrów (Mazowiecka) is feminine.
Declension Typical declension patterns are as follows:
("club"; an inanimate masculine noun) – N/A , G , D , I , L/V . Plural: N/A/V , G , D , I , L . ("map"; a feminine noun) – N , G , D/L , A , I , V . Plural: N/A/V , G , D , I , L . ("meat"; a neuter noun) – N/A/V , G , D , I , L . Plural: N/A/V , G , D , I , L .