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Trečioji pamoka

LESSON 3

DECLENSION

More About Declension.

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  • A few second declension nouns such as dede 'uncle',
    tete 'father' (a term of endearment), vaidila 'priest' (in pagan mythology)
    and some surnames are of the masculine gender. They are modified
    by masculine adjectives (cf. Lesson 11) and have masculine pronominal reference.

  • Some second declension nouns are of common gender,
    i.e. they can be either masculine or feminine depending upon the individual
    referred to:
  • nenuorama 'mischief-maker', 'unruly child',
  • naktibalda 'one who roves about at night',
  • vepla 'gaping fool, gaper'.

  • The preposition i 'in, into, to' indicates destination, also direction, never location.
    It always governs the accusative,.
  • i miesta, — into the city, to the city
  • i universiteta, — to the university

  • Važiuoti plus instrumental: 'to drive along'.....
  • važiuoti gatve — to drive along the street.

  • To express I like, Lithuanian uses the 3rd person of the verb :
    patikti 'to please' plus dative:
  • man patinka* (lit. it pleases to me) 'I like'.

    Dative Forms

    _Nominative_ ___________ ___Dative___ ___________ ___________
    I aš man man patinka I like
    thou, you tu tau tau patinka you like
    he jis jam jam patinka he likes
    she ji jai jai patinka she likes
    we mes mums mums patinka we like
    you jus jums jums patinka you like
    theyjie (masc.) jiems jiems patinka they like
    theyjos (fem.) joms joms patinkathey like

  • Since patinka is the third person for both singular and plural,
    it is used with singular, plural and infinitive subjects:
  • man patinka tas namas — I like that house
  • man patinka tie namai — I like those houses
  • man patinka skaityti bibliotekoje** — I like to read in the library

    NB. In replacing the nouns with personal pronouns, one has to keep in mind
    that Lithuanian, just like many other European languages strictly adheres to
    grammatical gender:

  • English......................Lithuanian

  • the city — it ........ .....miestas — jis (masc.)
  • the street — it ...........gatve — ji (fern.)

  • There is really no it as a personal pronoun.
  • Tai is used for such cases of general reference as:

  • Tai labai gražu. — That [it] is very beautiful.

    ________________
    * Irregular present tense: patinku, patinki, patinka, patinkame, patinkate, patinka
    ** More about 'I like', etc., see Lesson 6

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