Lithuanian declension: Difference between revisions

'''[[Lithuanian language|Lithuanian]] has a [[declension]]''' system that is similar to declensionsdeclension systems in ancient [[Indo-European languages]], such as [[Sanskrit language|Sanskrit]], [[Latin language|Latin]] or [[Ancient Greek language|Ancient Greek]]. It is one of the most complicated declension systems among modern Indo-European and modern European languages.{{Citation needed|reason=2010 Feb 3|date=February 2010}}

Traditionally, scholars count up to ten [[case (linguistics)|case]] forms in Lithuanian. However, at least one case is reduced to [[adverb]]s, and certain fixed expressions and another is extinct in the modern language. So the official variant of Lithuanian has seven cases; moreover, andthe an eighthillative case iscan usedbe inreplaced somewith dialectsthe andlocative reduced to an adverb in otherscase. The main cases are:

:* '''[[nominative case|nominative]]''' (''{{lang|lt|vardininkas''}}):; ''used to identify the [[inflection]] type''

:* '''[[genitive case|genitive]]''' (''{{lang|lt|kilmininkas''}}):; ''used to identify the [[inflection]] type''

:* [[Dative case|dative]] (''{{lang|lt|naudininkas''}})

:* [[Accusative case|accusative]] (''{{lang|lt|galininkas''}})

:* [[Instrumental case|instrumental]] (''{{lang|lt|įnagininkas''}})

:* [[locative case|locative]] ([[inessive case|inessive]]; ''{{lang|lt|vietininkas''}}) and with several subcases:

:** [[illative case|illative]]: (''{{lang|lt|kryptininkas''}})

:* ''[[allativevocative case|allativevocative]]:'' reduced to adverbs({{lang|lt|šauksmininkas}})

Lithuanian has two main [[grammatical number]]s: [[Grammatical number|singular]] and [[plural]]. There is also a [[dual (grammatical number)|dual number]], which is almostused unusedin certain dialects, thoughsuch aas few[[Samogitian dialect|Samogitian]]. Some words in the standard language retain their dual forms (for example {{wikt-lang|lt|du}} ("two") and {{wikt-lang|lt|abu}} ("both"), an indefinite number and super-plural words ({{lang-lt|dauginiai žodžiai}}). Dual forms of pronouns used in the standard language are also optional. Although grammatically the dual number can be applied to any word, in practice it was used quite sporadically during the last century. The singular and the plural are used similarly to many European languages. Singular, plural and dual [[inflection]]s of the same case always differ among themselves; no rule dictates how to form, for example, the plural inflection from the singular of the same case.

Lithuanian nouns have five [[declension]]s, which are defined by the [[inflection]] in singular nominative and genitive cases. Only a few borrowed words, like taksì – taxi, tabù – taboo, kupė̃ – compartment (in a train), coupé, are not subject to declension.

| rowspan=2|  Declension || colspan="2" | Inflection in singular cases || colspan=3 width="300px" | Examples || rowspan=2| Notes

# There are only two nouns ending in -i: {{lang|lt|pati}} 'wife' and {{lang|lt|marti}} 'daughter-in-law'. Their declension is the same to the second adjective feminine declension and similar to a second feminine noun palatalized declension. The noun pati is the same to a pronoun {{lang|lt|pati}} 'herself; myself ''f''; itself (for feminine nouns)'

# {{lang|lt|Duktė}} 'daughter' is the only word of the fifth declension not having the ending "uo". A word moteris 'woman, female' often has a genitive móters; the plural genitive of moteris is moterų (not palatalized -ių); it is the only normal form for the fifth declension and one of the two (the main is -ių) for the third. The moreother two words, obelis ''f'' – apple tree and dieveris ''m'' – (older) brother-in-law, are the same declensional case as {{lang|lt|moteris}}, but {{lang|lt|dieveris}}, being masculine possibly has a sg. inst. -iu. {{lang|lt|Dieveris}} is also the only -er- masculine case. There was also possibly a word {{lang|lt|broteris}} – brother (modern {{lang|lt|brolis}}) in old Lithuanian.

Each Lithuanian consonant (except {{IPA|[j]}}) has two [[Lithuanian language#Consonants 2|forms]]: palatalized and non-palatalized ({{IPA|[bʲ]}}-{{IPA|[b]}}, {{IPA|[dʲ]}}-{{IPA|[d]}}, {{IPA|[ɡʲ]}}-{{IPA|[ɡ]}} and so on). The consonants preceding vowels {{IPA|[i]}} and {{IPA|[e]}} are always moderately palatalized.

The letter i represents either the sound similar to i in the English lit or is a palatalization marker – softens the preceding consonant (ia = like e, iu = ü, io = ö; all samples where i is a softheningsoftening marker are ia (ią), iu (iū, ių), io). But {{sic|i|e|hide=y}} is a [[diphthong]] and there are no combinations ię and iė. Other diphthongs are: uo, ai, ei, oi (this one is used only in foreign words; in Lithuanian-derivation it is present when a word kojinė 'sock, stocking' is pronounced shorter as koinė), ui, au (palatalized iuo, iai, iui, iau; there is no iei combination because ei is already soft and same to iai; a combination {{sic|i|e|hide=y}} is only a diphthong and in use is succeeded by a consonant).

There are two consonants in Lithuanian, d and t, that become respectively dž {{IPA|[dʒ]}} and č {{IPA|[tʃ]}} when they precede a palatalization marker i (so, this does not include the softer sounds: i, į, y, {{sic|i|e|hide=y}}, ė, e, ę) and they still have to be pronounced softer, like all other consonants preceding the palatalization marker. Examples: masc. sg. nom. svẽčias 'guest', fem. sg. nom. valdžià 'power (on somebody); government', m. sg. nom. skaĩčius 'number'; pavyzdỹs 'example', pãvyzdžio, pãvyzdžiui, pãvyzdį; kėdė̃ 'chair', kėdžių̃ etc. (Compare how T in English is pronounced like "sh" when followed by -ion in words like "station", "revolution", or how "due"/ "dew" and "Jew" are pronounced identically by many English speakers).

In Lithuanian language, adjectives have three declensions determined by the singular and plural nominative case inflections. Adjectives are matchedagree with nouns in terms of number, gender, and case. Unlike nouns, which have two genders – masculine and feminine – adjectives have three (except -is, -ė adjectives), but the neuter adjectives (the third example in the table) have only one uninflected form.

Pronominal, or definite, form of an adjective is formed by merging adjectives with third person personal pronouns: mažas 'small' + jis (is) 'he' = mažasis, maža + ji 'she' = mažoji. An example: mažasis princas 'the little prince' (athe name of the novella is Mažasis princas – The Little Prince). And a normal form: mažas princas 'a little prince'.

! colspan=3 | !! Nominative !! GenitiveAccusative !! DativeGenitive !! AccusativeDative !! Instrumental !! Locative

| aš || manęsmane || manmanęs || maneman || manimi || manyje

| tu || tavęstave || tautavęs || tavetau || tavimi || tavyje

| jis || jojį || jamjo || jįjam || juo || jame

| ji || josją || jaijos || jąjai || ja || joje

| – || savęssave || sausavęs || savesau || savimi || savyje

! rowspan=46 | Plural  Dual   

! colspanrowspan=2 | 1st person !! Masculine

! rowspan=2 | 3rd2nd person !! Masculine

! rowspan=24 | 2nd person !! MasculinePlural

| juodujie ''or''|| jiedujuos || jųdviejųrowspan="2" || jiedviemjų || juodujiems || jiedviemjais || juodviesejuose

| jiedvijos || jųdviejųjas || jodviemjoms || jiedvijomis || jodviem || jiedviesejose

The word žmogus – man, (human), historically had the nominative singular žmuo (compare Latin homō). Today žmogus is declined in the fourth paradigm in singular (žmogus, žmogaus etc.) and in the third -ė paradigm in plural (žmonės, žmonių etc.).

The words of the third declension (-is, -ies) have either -ių or -ų in the genitive plural. The dative singular, similarly to the fifth declensional type, differs depending on the gender (-iai ''f'', -iui ''m''), the instrumental singular, differently from the fifth type, is the same for the both genders. One noun of the third type, petys, peties, has the sg. nom. ending with a long i: -ys. Some of the words having the suffix -uonis (there are few of such words) have parallel forms in the other declensions: palikuonis, -ies (''common gender'') and palikuonis, -io ''m'', palikuonė, -ės ''f''. Such change can happen after the change of an accent place: if the word is accented on the ending -is, then the change of declension (-is, -ies > -is, -io) does not occur in speech, and if the accent moves from the ending to the stem in singular nominative, then the change of declension sometimes occurs. For most of -uonis words, declining in the first declension is considered to be a mistake.

Also note, that inflection ofin the a-paradigm is different for nouns, adjectives, and pronouns in some cases. However, not every pronoun's isdeclension declined, usinguses the inflections from the "pronoun" column in the table below. Some pronouns, as well as every numeral of the a-paradigm, use the inflections from the "adjective" column.

====List of numbers, that don't use the a-paradigm====

* nouns of the third declension, which are mostly feminine (masculine exceptions are: '''dantis''' - 'tooth', '''debesis''' - 'cloud', '''vagis''' - ''thief'' andas well as a few nouns that end with '''-uonis''' in the singular nominative are masculine exceptions)

* Other cases than the singular nominative always have a suffix, '''-en-''' for masculine words and '''-er-''' for feminine words. There are only two feminine words, using the suffixed sub-paradigmsubparadigm, dukt'''ė''' - 'daughter' and ses'''uo''' - 'sister'.

* A word '''sesuo''' - 'sister' has a [[synonimsynonym]] '''sesė''', that's used in vocative ('sese!') more often, than the first ('seserie!'). The synonym ''sesė'' is of the ė-paradigm.

The first declension. Sg. nom. ends in -as, sg. acc. – in -ą. Latin words of this stem ends in -us in sg. nom., and -um in sg. acc. When these Latin endings succeeded a labial sound, their vowel was originally ŏ: equos – horse, equom; servos – slave, serf, servom. Sg. nom. in Prussian and Gothic is shortened: tavs, dags. Such shortening is present in western and northern Lithuanian dialects: tėvas, -o – father, and tėvs, -o; dagas, -o – heat of the sun (from degti – to burn), and dags, -o. In Prussian there existed only a shortened form, and it developed one step further in a part of the nouns: kaimis / kaimⁱs – village < kaims < kaimas (Lith. kaimas – village, kiemas – yard). There are no neuter nouns in Lithuanian and Latvian, differently from the other given here: Lith. butas – flat, living place, Prus. butan – the same meaning, Lat. aedificium – building. Lithuanian instrumental -u derives from an older -uo, what is seen, for example, in pronominal (definite) adjective forms, pronouns: gerù (nom. sg. gẽras – good) and gerúo-ju (nom. sg. geràsis – that good one), juõ (nom. sg. jis / is – he). Lithuanian diphthong uo corresponds to Latin ō. For dat. sg., an ending -uo is also known in dialects. Lithuanian acc. sg. and gen. pl. are written in the letters with an ogonek: ą and ų. An ogonek indicates that the sound is long. Historically these sounds were nasal: vilką < vilkan, vilkų < vilkun. The form with a sound -n is used in some places in north-west [[Samogitia]] today. Latin pl. dat.-abl. -īs corresponds to Ancient Greek pl. dat. -ois and Lithuanian pl. instr. -ais. Lithuanian sg. gen. corresponds to Slavic, for example, RussianLithuanian: vilko (also dial. vilkā) and Russian во́лка. Prussian sg. loc. was probably -ai, -ei: bītai (adverb) – in the evening, kvei – where;<ref name="Maziulis">{{citation| last=Mažiulis| first=Vytautas| title=Prūsų kalbos istorinė gramatika| year=2004 | page=39|language=lt}}</ref> compare Lith. namiẽ – at home (namè – in the house).

| style="padding: 0px 0px 10px 0px;" | {{small|top}}<br> || style="padding: 0px 0px 10px 0px;" | {{small|lake}}<br> || style="padding: 0px 0px 10px 0px;" | {{small|fount}}<br> || style="padding: 0px 0px 10px 0px;" | {{small|son}} || || style="padding: 0px 0px 10px 0px;" | {{small|fish}} || style="padding: 0px 0px 10px 0px;" | {{small|son}}

| style="padding: 0px 0px 10px 0px;" | {{small|flower}} || style="padding: 0px 0px 10px 0px;" | {{small|thing}} || || style="padding: 0px 0px 10px 0px;" | {{small|earth}} || style="padding: 0px 0px 10px 0px;" | {{small|technique}}

| style="font-size: 85%;"| DatIns. || -iem || colspan="3" | -iem* || colspan="2" | -ām || -ēm || colspan="2" | -īm || colspan="2" | -iem || colspan="2" | -eņ-iem* || -iem || -ām