Russian Tutorial

written by Stephen VanZuylen

Note: Before heading to the tutorial I would Strictly recommend to download any
online dictionary which could easily translate the difficult Russian words
provided below so that you can understand them easily and learn quickly, if
you have one so thats good if not then Ill personally prefer BabelFish
dictionary which is free so you dont need to buy it. The download link is
provided below:

Download BabelFish Translator

1. Basic Phrases
Yes

dah

No

nyet

Maybe

moh-zhit bit'

Hello (Formal Usage)

zdrav-stvoo-tye

Hi (Informal Usage)

preev-yet

Good Day, Hello

doh-bry dzyen'

Good Evening

doh-bry vyecher

Good Night

doh-broo-y noh-tchi

Good Bye (General

use/more formal)

duh-svee-dah-nya

See You (informal)

pah-kah

See you tomorrow

dah zav-trah

Please/You're Welcome

pah-zhahl-stah

Thank You

spah-see-bah

Sorry

prah-stee-tye

Welcome

dah-broh poh-zhahl-oh-vat'

How are you doing?

?
kahk dze-la?

(Not) bad
()
(neh)ploh-khah

As always

Kahk vseg-dah

Excellent

Pleased to meet you (lit. "it is

How old are you?


Khah-rah-sho

very pleasant")

oh-chen' pree-yaht-nah

?
Skohl-kuh vahm l-yet

I'm x years old

__
m-nyeh __ l-yet

Excuse me...

eez-vee-nee-tye

Do you speak English?

?
vi znah-yeh-tye an-gleeskee

What languages do you

know?
K ?
kahk-ee-ye yah-zik-ee vi
znah-ye-tye?

How do you say x in Russian?

I don't understand
-...?
()
Kahk pah-roos-kee
yah (nyeh-) poh-nee-mahyoo

I (don't) know
()
yah (neh-) znah-yoo

Where are you from?

?
aht-koo-dah vi?

What is your name?

?
kahk vas zah-voot

My name is...

meen-yah zah-voot...

What time is it?

C ?
skohl-kuh vreh-meh-nee?

How much does it cost?

?
skohl-kuh stoy-it

Do you know where x is?

...?
vi znah-yeh-tye g-dze

Do you want...?
?
Ti kho-tchesh

Is that everything?
?
eh-ta f-syoh?

No, that isn't necessary

,
nyet, neh nah-duh

Help me!
!
pah-mah-gee-tyeh

Bless you! (after cough or

sneeze)
!
Boodz-tye z-dah-roh-vi

Could you repeat that?

! ()
Pav-toh-ree-tye! (pahzhahl-stah)

Bold syllables indicate stress.

2. Pronunciation & Alphabet

The Russian Alphabet, known as Cyrillic or (Ki-reel-lee-tsa) has 33 letters;

21 consonants, 10 vowels and two signs. The letters are:
and . In order to make this explanation
easier, the letters are broken down into specific groups. While many who are unfamiliar
with the alphabet dismiss it as being too hard, the alphabet is deceptively simple, as the
phonetic principle is very prominent, and successive reforms have removed excess letters
and greatly simplified the spelling system.
Consonants

-- Beh
Best

-- Veh
Vent

-- Geh
Gift

-- Deh
Deep

-- Zheh
Pleasure

-- Zeh
Zebra

-- i
York

kratkoye
King

-- Kah
Lion

-- El
Mend

-- Em
Next

-- En
Pet

-- Peh
trilled r

-- Err
Sink

-- Es
Tape

-- Teh
Find

-- Ef
Kh, like German

-- Khah
machen

-- Tseh
Boots

-- Cheh
Chair

-- Shah
Ship
-- Shchah
See note*
*I have heard two ways of pronouncing the letter , which I will assume to be regional
variances. The first is to begin with a sound with a made just after without pause.
(The example "fresh cheese" is most common.) The second is to make a "sh" sound, but
push your jaw slightly forward and tighten the corners of your lips into a kind of semismile.
In addition to the above consonants, there are certain variations in the sound made for
most consonants, referred to most often as "soft" consonants. Rather than add new letters
to represent these sounds, the Russian Alphabet shows them in one of two ways: either
through a softening vowel, or should there be no vowel, a soft sign, used below. An
explanation of how to pronounce these individually are below as well. The signs have
additional uses, explained later.

Soft Consonants
-Like , but voiced
-Push your lower lip upwards so the inside
touches the lower front portion of your front teeth
- Use the frontal portion of your tongue rather
than just the tip to make a sound similar to "dz" or the
d in the French "jeudi."
-This is, in theory, a voiced version of , but is
rarely spoken as anything other than , and is marked
by , not , for reasons explained later.
-Push your lower jaw forward a little, and/or press
the first centimeter or so of your tongue just behind
your front teeth.
-Use the whole front portion of your tongue to
make an l sound like that in French or German.
-Press the front of your tongue against the top of
your mouth, just behind the front teeth; sounds like
Spanish .
-Like the p in "computer"
-Similar to a regular , but with more aspiration.
-This is a devoiced version of the soft .
-Sounds a bit like but with the front of the
tongue on the roof of the mouth. The t in the French
"tu" makes the same sound.
-Like , but devoiced.

"Soft" Vowels

Yeh
Yes

Yoh Yodel

Ee
Feet
Yu Youth

Yah Yacht
is always stressed

*This is difficult to pronounce until you hear it, a sort of mix between the u in "under,"
the i in "if," and the ee in "feet;" until you have heard it a few times, pronounce it like the
i in "if."

(If you know Romanian, is the same sound as , and if you know Polish, it is the same
sound as y. A similar vowel is found in the Turkish l, but is made further forward in the
mouth.)
Pronunciation
With

Wide
/
Bay

Boy

Hooey
While most Cyrillic typefaces' letter forms may look only slightly different than the one
used on this page, the letter forms of handwritten Russian are decidedly different, and can
be easily comfused to those unfamiliar with them. My own handwriting being as terrible
as it is, I would recommend downloading OdessaScript to get an idea of what the letter
forms should look like, and Pushkin for a more stylized and "realistic" example. The key
to learning the written script is practice; start by mimicking the OdessaScript letters
individually, copying them out 20-30 times in a row before moving onto the next one.
Then move on to words of 3-5 letters, and finally onto longer words. Copying out poems,
newspaper articles and other short texts can be the final step, and aid greatly in keeping
your skills up to par.
3. Further Notes on Pronunciation
The "Signs"
The , or ("soft sign,") as noted before, denotes a soft consonant when
there is no vowel present to perform that function. However, when placed in front of a
soft vowel, it not only shows a soft consonant, indicates a more strongly pronounced y
(as in yoke) sound in the vowel following.
The , or ("hard sign,") fulfills the same latter function of the soft sign,
but also indicates that the preceding consonant is hard, despite the soft vowel following
it. This is, however, a rarely used letter and is seen mostly in verb prefixes, as in
, and the like, and can also be marked with a double quotation or ".
Stress
Whenever you learn a new word, be sure to remember the stress patterns, as unlike
Polish, Czech, and some other Slavic languages, syllable stress in Russian is free,
unpredictable, and sometimes mobile; two-syllable neuter words, for instance, almost
always change stress in the plural. For a graphic example of the importance of stress, the
verb (stressed on a) which means "to write," can have its meaning suddenly and
easily changed to , (stress on ) which means "to piss," so be careful!
Vowel Reduction
As with any language, there are certain differences in vowel pronounciation to be heard
in different areas of Russia. Many of the boundaries of these differences remain a subject

of debate, but below are the common changes in vowel pronunciation commonly heard in
and around the Moscow region, and is thus considered the "standard" form of Russian.
--The O rule: an unstressed o, before the point of stress, is pronounced like an a, and after
the point of stress, makes an "uh" sound, a schwa in linguistic terms.
--The Rule: an unstressed before the point of stress is pronounced like the i in if,
whereas a finial is pronounced normally.
--The E rule: at the beginning of a word, e is always pronounced as "ye," regardless of
stress. An unstressed e, unless preceded by a vowel is pronounced like a "schwa", though
any preceding consonant is still softened.
In virtually all spoken forms, all final consonants are devoiced.
4. Spelling & Combination Rules
There are three main spelling rules that you have to know in Russian; they are fairly
simple and easy to remember, so don't forget them!
The 7-Letter Rule
After , , , , , , & , write instead of
The 5-Letter Rule
After , , , , , dont write O if its unstressed; write E instead
The Hush Rule
After , , , , dont write or ; use or instead
Note that the letters , and are always soft, and , , and are always considered
hard; this means that after the former two, a is always pronounced as , is always
pronounced like , and so on, while after the latter three, sounds like , and sounds
like .
Rules of Combination
Once you start changing words as required by inflection (nouns, adjectives, pronouns)
or conjugation (verbs) you not only have to apply the three rules above, but also the rules
of vowel combination. Don't worry though; once you understand hard and soft
consonants and the vowels/signs that reflect them, this makes absolute sense.
Rule # 1: After or , of there is a hard vowel, the two "blend" to form the soft variant
This table shows it how it works:
When Meets You And plus equals
this... this... get... this... this... this...

One little thing: or plus o always makes e unless it is stressed; only then does it
become
To illustrate this, I will use the adjective (Dark Blue) Notice the soft H.
Say I want to make the feminine-nominative form:
Take , and add the proper adjective ending, -. Thus we get + or .
However, +=, so we get
Or say I want the neuter-genitive:
Take and the proper ending, . Thus we get . However + when
unstressed as here =, so we get
Rule # 2: After or , if there is a soft vowel, the former is removed and the latter left on
its own.
Take for instance . Want the plural? Add -, and you get , but the soft sign
gets absorbed, so we end up with
Keep in mind, however, that if there is a soft sign in front of a soft vowel already in the
singular-nominative form, leave it alone, as it performs a phonetic, rather than
grammatical, function. For instance: The singular-nominative (family) becomes
in the plural; the soft sign was in front of the vowel already and so it stays there.
If you need some more help with this, I would suggest checking out this page.
5. The Fleeting Vowel
Every once in a while you'll notice how sometimes words gain or lose a penultimate e or
o outside of regular declension or conjugation. For instance, if I wanted the genitive
plural of the word "" (letter,) the standard is to remove the finial o, leaving us
with "." However, the actual form in the genitive plural is "." Where did that
e come from? The e is actually an unstressed, softened o; the o is added based on an
alternating paradigm left over from ancient Russian. However in this case, because of the
soft sign, and because the stress is on the first syllable and not the new letter, we end up
with an e.
One little trick is usually right: if you get an awkward consonant cluster, say the word
out loud; if you find yourself adding an "uh" sound, chances are, an o is needed, so add it
in and go through the spelling rules checklist and the word should now be spelled

correctly, though one common exception is words that end in -; the genitive plural is
-. Also, sometimes it is an e, even when there is no soft sign present. For those a little
more confident or curious, you can apply the alternation rule, which is best explained
here.
These "fleeting vowels" also disappear in declension. Take for instance (father,)
in the genitive singular: ; the dative singular: ; and the genitive plural: .
Normally when a word ends with an e or o plus consonant, the e/o is dropped and the
new ending placed after the consonant. These seem unpredictable at first, but with
patience, they are not a problem.
6. Nouns and Gender
Russian nouns belong to one of three genders: Masculine, ( ) Feminine
( ) and Neuter ( ). Unlike German and some of the Romance
languages, the gender of a noun can be easily assessed, simply by looking at the ending in
the nominative case.
Masculine nouns end in consonants or
Feminine nouns end in -, -, or -
Neuter nouns end in -, -, or -
There are a few exceptions to this rule, but they are easy to spot:
-There are a few masculine nouns that end in a; these are usually associated exclusvely
with males, such as (man,) (uncle,) (grandfather,) and the like,
or "familiar" forms of masculine names, like , , and so on. These nouns
have one attribute that is easy to remember: they decline like feminine nouns, but any
demonstratives, adjectives and the like decline like masculine nouns.
-There are 10 words which are neuter, yet end in -. These have their own unique
declension class, which is shown below, and all demonstratives, adjectives and the like
use the standard neuter endings. The words are: (burden,) (time,)
(udder,) (banner,) (given name,) (flame,) (tribe,) (seed,)
(stirrup) and (crown.)
-Neuter nouns ending in - or - that are direct imports from foreign languages, such as
, , or do not decline at all, regardless of what case they ought ot be in,
however any adjectives or demonstratives tied to them do.
-And finally, there are a number of nouns, which end in - and can be either masculine or
feminine. There are generally few ways to predict this, however, if a noun ends in -,
such as (fortress,) or it ends in a hush-plus-soft-sign, (-, -, -, -) it is
feminine. Masculine nouns with a - ending decline like those ending with . The
feminine ones have their own declension class, detailed below.

7. Personal Pronouns
Personal Pronouns
Case

I/Me

Nominative
Accusative
Dative
Genitive
Prepositional
Instrumental

You
He/It She We You They
(singular/
(plural/
informal)
formal)

Note that when preceded by a preposition, those pronouns beginning with a vowel take
an H- on the beginning.
8. Demonstrative Pronouns
Demonstrative Pronouns
This/These
Case
Masc.
Fem. Neut.
Pl.
Nominative

Accusative / /
Dative
Genitive

Prepositional

Instrumental

That/Those
Masc. Fem. Neut. Pl.

/ /

Notes on : Not only is this word the neuter-nominative, it is also used in the
predicative sense; that means if you want to say "this is" or "is this," you simply write
. (See section 36 for more on this.) Also, you may have noticed that there are no
articles (a, an, the) in Russian, a fact that can make direct translations sound strange at
times; if you wish to indicate that you are speaking about a specific thing, you can use the
, , or .
9. Possessive Pronouns

Possessive Pronoun My/Mine

Case
Masc.
Fem.
Neut.
Pl.
Nominative

Accusative
/

/
Dative

Genitive

Prepositional

Instrumental

Pronouns that decline like this one: (your/yours informal)

Note that the possessive pronouns (his,) (her,) (their) do not decline.

Possessive Pronoun Our/Ours

Case
Masc.
Fem.
Neut.
Pl.
Nominative

Accusative

Dative

Genitive

Prepositional

Instrumental

Pronouns that decline like this one: - (your/yours formal, plural)

10. The Pronoun / (Both)

In Russian, there are two ways of sayng "both" as we would know the word. Here, it is
used as a semi-adjective and often with nouns, such as "both children" or "both players"
and so on. If you wish to use the word both in the sense of "both x and y," you must use
the conjunction ..., discussed in section 29.
Case
Masc./Neut.
Fem
Nominative
o
o
Accusative o/ o/o

Dative
Genitive
Prepositional
Instrumental

11. The Case System: Introduction to Inflection

To those who have studied languages such as German, Greek, Latin or another Slavic
Language, you are already familiar with the concepts of inflection and can likely skip this
introduction, but if you haven't, it helps to receive a quick introduction.
To give a dictionary style answer, inflection is the process where a word is changed
(declined) relative to its role as a part of speech in a sentence. Thus in Russian, nouns and
other declining words have different forms depending on whether they are the subject,
direct object, indirect object, or possessor. English has lost most of it's ancient inflection
system, but there are a few remnants to build off of. Let's start with a common, and often
ignored, mistake in English: "Me and my friend went to a movie." We are often told that
this is properly written as "My friend and I wend to a movie," but rarely told why. The
answer is that the pronoun I is in the subjective (or nomnative) form, or case, while me is
in the objective (accusative/dative) case; that is, marking the sucject and object (direct or
indirect) respectively. "Me," thus, cannot be used as the subject of a sentence! Here is a
quick summary of the personal pronouns in English:
Subjective I You He She We They
Objective Me You Him Her Us Them
If a pronoun is the subject, it must be in the subjective case, and when it is an object, it
must be in the objective case; sounds simple enough. Unfortunately, English does not
have separate pronouns to disambiguate the direct and indirect objects, thus relying on
prepositions and word order to do the job instead. The direct and indirect objects can be
written one of two ways:
-"He gave her it."
-"He have it to her."
(The direct object is bold, the indirect is italic)
In Russian, the word break-down for the same sentence would look like this:
- "he;" subject; nominative case
- "to give" past tense, masculine
- "it;" direct object; accusative case
- "her;" indirect object; dative case
It would then be written as " " or any combination of those words, so long
as they remain in their proper case.

If you are translating from Russian, the subject and objects are easy to see, as the case
is evident, but when trying to translate into Russian, it is often difficult at first due to the
ambiguities of English grammar. Until you are familiar with these concepts enough to
feel confident, it helps to use this methodology: when you come across a sentence, the
first thing you should look at is the verb, which is key to finding the subject/object. Let's
say the verb is "to take." Ask yourself the following questions:
--For the Subject: "Who or what did or is doing the taking?"
--For the Direct Object: "Who or what was/is being taken?"
--For the Indirect Object: "To whom or to what was the direct object taken?"
Keep these questions in mind as you practice and learn and adapt them to the specific
verb and subject/objects you are using at the time and you should not have too many
problems.
However, as you have seen form the tables just above this section, Russian has cases
for more than just subjects and objects, for a total of six, and unlike English, not only
pronouns, but also nouns and adjectives all change by case. The concept of case usage
can be overwhelming if you are unfamiliar with the idea, so it helps to learn just one or
two at the most at one time, and only moving on when you are comfortable in your
knowledge, as learning all of them in one stretch can complicate matters greatly. Also,
keep this in mind: if you were never taught these grammatical concepts before, it will
take a little extra effort to fully comprehend it all, but there is a plethora of additional
resources, both on-line and in print to help you understand, all of which are usually easy
to find, so it is far from impossible.
In this tutorial, each of the six cases used in Russian is given an individual treatment
with nouns of all genders, as they are more complicated than pronouns. For the examples,
I have used the same series of words to show the patterns in inflection. They are:
(television), (museum), (king), (car), (land,
earth), (surname), (kindness), (lake), (dress),
(opinion), and (time).
12. The Nominative Case ( )
This case is used to indicate the subject of the sentence, as well as in comparisons
following , and a few other instances, discussed later. If you look up a word in the
dictionary, it is always in the nominative case unless stated otherwise.
Forming the plural:
Masc.
Masc Masc. Fem. - Fem. Fem.- Fem. -
(consonant)
-
-
-
New
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
ending
Example

Plural

Neut.
-

New ending
Example
Plural

Neut.
-

Neut. -
-

Neut. -
-

There are a few exceptions for masculine nouns ending in a consonant; rather than
ending in , they take a stressed a. There is no real way of predicting them, so the easiest
way to memorize them, in my opinion, is to say the singular and plural forms out loud;
you'll remember the different forms as you remember the pronunciation of the word. Be
careful, however, not to confuse them with the gentive-singular forms, which often look
exactly the same.
Examples:
-Bridge - - Bridges
-City - - Cities
In addition, there are a number of words that end in -; these decline regularly except
in the nominative plural, where it becomes -, and in the genintive plural, where it
becomes -
13. The Accusative Case ( )
The Accusative is used to indicate the direct object of a sentence or phrase, that is the
noun on which the action was performed. Simple as this may sound, this case is
complicated by the fact that it is, in effect, five cases; masculine nouns are the same as
the nominative form, unless they are animate, in which case t takes the noun takes the
genitive case endings; neuter nouns are always the same as the nominative; and feminine
nouns ending in - or - become - and -, while those ending in - stay the same, all
regardless of animacy, while in the plural, they are like the nominative plural, unless it is
animate, in which case it takes the genitive.
Forming the singular:

New ending
Example

Masc.
(consonant)
-

Masc - Masc. - Fem. - Fem. - Fem.-

Fem. -

--
-
-
-
-
*

*animate, thus the endings are genitive

New ending
Example

Neut.
-

Neut.
-

Neut. -
-

Neut. -
-

Forming the plural:

New
ending
Example

Masc.
(consonant)
-

Masc - Masc. - Fem. - Fem. - Fem.-

-

Fem. -

*animate, thus the endings are genitive

New ending
Example

Neut.
-

Neut.
-

Neut. -
-

Neut. -
-

14. The Dative Case ( )

The Dative is used to mark the indirect object in the sentence or phrase, that is, the
recipient or "benefactor" of the action. It can also represent the opinion statements "to
me..." or "for me..." Forming the Dative in Russian is very easy; Masculine and neuter
nouns take - or - as the ending, depending on whether or not it is hard or soft, and
Feminine nouns take - regardless. There is a caveat here: if the (feminine) word ends in
-, it takes - in the dative, and if it ends in -, it takes -. The plural is even easier: all
nouns take - or -, depending on a hard or soft ending .
Forming the singular:
Masc.
(consonant)

Masc - Masc. - Fem. - Fem. - Fem.-

Fem. -

New ending
Example

New ending
Example

-
-
-
-
-
-

Neut.
-

Neut.
-

Neut. -
-

Neut -
-

Forming the plural:

Masc.
Masc - Masc. - Fem. - Fem. - Fem.-
Fem. -
(consonant)
New
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
ending
Example

New ending
Example

Neut.
-

Neut.
-

Neut. -
-

Neut. -
-

15. The Genitive Case ( )

The Genitive is perhaps the most versatile of all of the cases in Russian; it shows
ownership or possession ( -- my sister's room,) construction
involving "of" ( -- A photo of the new house,) amounts of
things ( -- many people,) in conjunction with numbers ( -- five
brothers,) and more. It's formation in the singular is highly regular; masculine and neuter
nouns take - or - depending on whether it is hard or soft; feminine nouns take the letter
- or- , again depending on whether it's hard o soft.
The genitive plural, however, is probably the most difficult aspect of noun declension;
there are even jokes about it in Russian. Masculine nouns ending in consonants take -
and those ending in take - or -, but masculine nouns ending in -, -, -, -, and
-, all take the ending -. Feminine and neuter nouns ending in - and - lose that letter,

- and - take- , and feminine and neuter nouns ending in- and - both take the -.
Finally, feminine nouns ending in -, as well as neuter and feminine nouns with - just
prior to the final vowel, such as , all take the ending .
Forming the singular:

New ending
Example

Masc.
(consonant)
-

New ending
Example

Masc - Masc. - Fem. - Fem. - Fem.-

Fem. -

-
-
-
-
-
-

Neut.
-

Neut.
-

Neut. -
-

Neut. -
-

Forming the plural:

New
ending
Example

Masc.
(consonant)
-

New ending
Example

Masc - Masc. - Fem. - Fem. - Fem.-

-

--

--

Fem. -

Neut.
-

Neut. -
-

Neut. -
-

16. The Prepositional Case ( )

This is probably the easiest case to learn other than the nominative. It is used purely
with prepositions; it is never used on its own, hence its name. The prepositions are
(in/at) (on/at/in) (about) (near/next to/in the time of/on one's person). To form it,
masculine neuter and feminine nouns take -e in the singular, unless it is feminine and
ends in -, in which case it becomes -, or - or -, which become -. The plural is
- or - depending on the stem.
Forming the singular:
Masc. (consonant) Masc - Masc. - Fem. - Fem. - Fem.- Fem. -
New ending
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
Example

nding
Example

Neut.
-

Neut.
-

Neut. -
-

Neut. -
-

Forming the plural:

New
ending
Example

Masc.
(consonant)
-

Masc - Masc. -
-

Fem. - Fem. - Fem.-

-

Fem. -
-

nding
Example

Neut.
-

Neut.
-

Neut. -
-

Neut. -
-

There is an exception here; in the singular masculine, there are a number of nouns that
take a stressed - or -, but this is ONLY when used with the prepositions or ; if you
use o or , you use the regular prepositional ending.
Examples:
-- Forest - c - In the Forest, - Near the Forest
-- Ball - - At the Ball, - About the Ball
17. The Instrumental Case ( )
This is the final case you need to learn. It is used to indicate how an action is carried
out, roughly the same as the English "by" or "with," the German "per," or the French
"par." It is also used following the verb (to be,) or following certain verbs where it
acts as the word "as," like , "to work as a waitress," as well as in
the sense of "by" in the passive voice, discussed later. It is also used in time references
like (in the evening) or (in the autumn). The formation is rather
straightforward: masculine and neuter nouns take - or - depending on the ending;
feminine nouns ending in - and - take the ending - or -, while those ending in -
take the ending -. The main exception is feminine nouns ending in -, which take the
ending -. The plural is even easier to form: simply add - or - depending on the
original ending.
Forming the singular:
Masc.
Masc - Masc. - Fem. - Fem. - Fem.-
Fem. -
(consonant)
New
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
ending
Example

nding
Example

Neut.
-

Neut.
-

Neut. -
-

Neut. -
-

Forming the plural:

Masc.
Masc - Masc. -
Fem. -
Fem. -
Fem.-
Fem. -
(consonant)
nding
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
Example

nding
Example

Neut.
-

Neut.
-

Neut. -
-

Neut. -
-

18. Summary of Regular Noun Case Endings

N -A n/g
D -
G -
P -
I

- - - -
-n/g - -n/g n/g
n/g
- - - -
- - - -
- - - -
- -

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
-n/g - -n/g - -n/g - -n/g - -n/g - - - - - -
-
-
-

-
-
-

-
--

-
-
-

-
-
-

-
-
-

-
-
-

-
-
-

-
-
-

-
-
-

-
--

-
-
-

-
-
-

-
-
-

-
-
-

19. Adjectives
Adjectives must agree with the nouns that they modify in gender, number and case.
Adjective endings are distinctive for each case. One more thing: although written as ,
the genitive endings are pronounced as though they were written . However, this is
only for endings associated with the genitive case. Also, some masculine-nominative
nouns have - instead of as its ending. This does not change the declension patterns,
however.
Hard Stem Adjective ( - Black/dark)
Case
Masc.
Fem.
Neut.

Pl.

Nominative
Accusative
Dative
Genitive
Prepositional
Instrumental

Case
Nominative
Accusative
Dative
Genitive
Prepositional
Instrumental

Soft Stem Adjective ( - Medium/middle)

Masc.
Fem.
Neut.

Pl.

You should know that a number of adjectives, such as (scientist) or

(worker) and decline like adjectives but are otherwise treated as nouns.
There are also four short form adjectives, used only in the nominative. They appear as
follows:
Masculine
Feminine
Neuter
Plural

Their usage is discussed in section 35.