Polish morphology

Morphophonologic alternations

• Consonants in clusters and at the end of words are affected by the voicing rules; these are generally not reflected in the spelling. For example, the d in sąd is pronounced, while in inflected forms such as the plural sądy it is pronounced.
• The vowels i and y have restricted distribution: i does not occur after c, cz, d, dz, dż, ł, r, sz, t, ż/rz, while y does not occur after k, g, l and palatal consonants. This means that in certain inflectional forms i appears in place of the expected y or vice versa.
• The declension endings starting with the vowel e or i have the effect of palatalizing the preceding consonant. Due to historical developments, the actual effect is dependent on the consonant.
• ** don't change
• ***i changes to y after
• *** adjectival stem that ends in sz ż + masculine personal plural -i > si zi
• ** >
• ** >
• ** >
• ** >
• ** >
• ** >
• ** >
• ** >
• ** >
• ** >
• ** >
• ** >
• ** >
• *** a noun ending in k + -em > kiem
• *** a noun ending in k + plural i > ki or cy
• ** >
• *** a noun ending in g + -em >
• *** a noun ending in g + plural i > gi or dzy
• ** >
• *** a noun ending in ch + plural i > si or chy
• Some words are subject to certain vowel alternations, caused by historical sound changes in Polish. The alternations are as follows :
• *Alternations that depend on whether the syllable is closed or open:
• **ó–o
• **ą–ę
• ** -∅
• *Alternations that take effect when the following consonant is modified by a palatalizing ending
• ** a–e
• ** o ''–e''

Nouns

• The nominative and vocative plural are always identical.
• For neuter nouns, the nominative, accusative and vocative are always identical in both singular and plural.
• The accusative of masculine nouns is identical to either the nominative or the genitive.
• The locative, dative and instrumental plural almost always have the same endings no matter how the noun is declined.

Masculine nouns

• * dative singular ending is -owi
• * locative singular ending is -u
• * nominative plural is -e for non-personal nouns, and -e or -owie for personal nouns
• * genitive plural is -i or -ówdeclension II – all nouns ending in c, cz, dz, dż, rz, sz, ż
• * dative singular ending is -owi or -u
• * locative singular ending is -u
• * nominative plural is -e for non-personal nouns, and -e, -y or -owie for personal nouns
• * genitive plural is -y or -ówdeclension III – all nouns ending in k, g, ch
• * dative singular ending is -owi
• * locative singular ending is -u
• * nominative plural is -ki, -gi, -chy, respectively, for non-personal nouns, and -owie or -cy, -dzy, -si, respectively, for personal nouns
• * genitive plural is -ówdeclension IV – all nouns ending in d, f, ł, n, r, s, t, z and nouns ending in p, b, m, w that do not gain palatalization in the oblique cases
• * dative singular ending is -owi or -u
• * locative singular ending is -e
• * nominative plural is -y for non-personal nouns, and -i or -owie for personal nouns
• * genitive plural is -ówdeclension V – personal nouns ending in -anin
• * dative singular ending is -owi
• * locative singular ending is -e
• * nominative plural is -anie
• * genitive plural is -an or -anów

• Many personal nouns, especially those ending in -og, can take both forms of the nominative plural, with one form more frequent than the other for no apparent reason.
• Personal nouns can become non-personal in the plural to form "depreciative forms", which convey negative attitude; for example policjanty instead of policjanci or ministry instead of ministrowie. Sometimes the ending may be the same, but the change of gender is conveyed through adjectives and pronouns agreeing with the noun, for example te wstrętne burżuje instead of ci wstrętni burżuje.

• The vocative singular of Bóg is Boże.
• In the plural, the stem of brat is braci-.
• The stem of for oblique cases is, inflected according to the fourth declension.
• Człowiek has a suppletive plural ludzie, inflected according to the first declension.
• The declension of dech is tchu, tchu/tchowi, dech, tchem, tchu, tchu.
• The noun deszcz has an archaic genitive dżdżu, used in the phrase łaknąć/pragnąć jak kania dżdżu.
• The vocative singular of ksiądz is księże. Its plural declension is księża, księży, księżom, księży, księżmi, księża.
• The declension of the noun książę is książę, księcia, księciu, księcia, księciem, księciu, książę in the singular, and książęta, książąt, książętom, książeta, książętami, książętom, książętami, książęta in the plural.
• The genitive plural of przyjaciel is przyjaciół, the dative plural is przyjaciołom, the instrumental plural is przyjaciółmi, and the locative plural is przyjaciołach.
• The nouns pan, syn and dom have -u in the locative and vocative singular despite belonging to the fourth declension group; pan has vocative panie.Rok has a suppletive neuter plural lata.
• The declension of the nouns sędzia and hrabia is sędzia/hrabia, sędziego/hrabiego, sędziemu/hrabiemu, sędziego/hrabiego, sędzią/hrabią, sędzi/hrabi, sędzio/hrabio in the singular, and sędziowie/hrabiowie, sędziów/hrabi, sędziom/hrabiom, sędziów/hrabiów, sędziami/hrabiami, sędziach/hrabiach, sędziowie/hrabiowie.
• A few masculines have plurals in -a, usually as an alternative to the regular plural.

Feminine nouns

• Feminine nouns in -i have this -i only in the nominative and vocative singular. In all other cases they decline like soft a-stem nouns.
• Soft feminine nouns that are familiar forms of personal names have a vocative in -u or with no ending.

• Some feminine i-stem nouns, especially those in -ość have N/A/V/G plural in -y/i rather than -e.
• Nouns with the suffix -ość, as well as a few other nouns form the instrumental plural by adding just -mi rather than -ami.

Neuter nouns

• Some neuter nouns take -y/i in the genitive plural, particularly those ending in -e that have a prefix.
• Some neuter nouns that were borrowed from Latin end in -um. These are indeclinable in the singular but follow the hard or soft neuter declension in the plural.

Irregular nouns

• dziecko has plural N/A/V/G dzieci.
• ręka has N/A/V plural ręce ; oko and ucho have plural oczy/uszy etc.. These derive from old dual forms.
• pani has accusative singular panią.

Invariant nouns

• Names of letters
• Some foreign-derived words that do not fit any standard pattern
• Most foreign place names
• Personal names of females that don't end in -a
• Normally masculine nouns used as feminines to refer to women
• Titles of works etc. that do not have the form of nouns/adjectives
• Nouns that are already inflected
• Names preceded by a specifying noun

Adjectives

• The longer ending -iejszy is used in certain adjectives, especially those in consonant+ny, for pronounceability: ładny–ładniejszy.
• The adjectival ending -ki or -oki is dropped, as in krótki–krótszy, szeroki–szerszy.
• Irregular comparatives include lepszy, gorszy, większy, mniejszy, węższy, dłuższy.
• For adjectives that do not have such forms, the words bardziej and najbardziej are used before the adjective to make comparative and superlative phrases.

Pronouns

Personal pronouns

• 1st person singular N ja, G/A/L mnie, D mnie, I mną
• 2nd person singular familiar N ty, G/A ciebie, D tobie, I tobą, L tobie
• 3rd person singular masculine N on, G/A jego/niego, D jemu/niemu, I/L nim
• 3rd person singular feminine N ona, G/D jej/niej, A ją/nią, I nią, L niej
• 3rd person singular neuter N ono, A je/nie, other cases as masculine
• 1st person plural N my, G/A/L nas, D nam, I nami
• 2nd person plural familiar N wy, G/A/L was, D wam, I wami
• 3rd person plural masculine personal N oni, G/A ich/nich, D im/nim, I nimi, L nich
• 3rd person plural other N one, A je/nie, other cases as for masculine personal

Reflexive pronouns

Possessive pronouns

Demonstrative pronouns

• Tego/Tamtego are used for the Masculine Animate declension and Ten/Tamten are used for the Masculine inanimate declension.
• * tą is only used in informal speech, tę is the standard written form.

Interrogative pronouns

Numbers and quantifiers

• 1 jeden like an adjective. The plural forms also exist ; they are used to mean "some", or to mean "one" with pluralia tantum.
• 2 dwa, G/L dwóch, D dwóm, I dwoma
• 3 trzy, G/L trzech, D trzem, I trzema
• 4 cztery, G/L czterech, D czterem, I czterema
• 5 pięć, G/D/L pięciu, I pięcioma
• The same pattern as 5 is followed for the higher numbers sześć, siedem, osiem, dziewięć, dziesięć; jedenaście etc.; dwadzieścia, trzydzieści, czterdzieści, pięćdziesiąt etc.; sto, dwieście, trzysta, czterysta ; pięćset etc. From 500 onwards the instrumental is the same as the G/D/L form.

• , G, D/L, I
• , G, D/L, I
• , G, D/L, I. Similarly for etc.

• , G/D/L and masc. personal N/A, I. Similarly,,,,
• are invariant
• forms like behave like 15, 50, 500
• oba behaves like dwa, but usually with obu where dwa has dwóch. The other word for "both", obydwa, inflects like dwa.

Verbs

• Pattern 1: -m, -sz, - ; -my, -cie, -ją. This is followed by many verbs in -ać, such as śpiewać : śpiewam, śpiewasz, śpiewa etc. It is also followed by mieć : mam etc.; umieć : umiem etc.; jeść : jem etc., but 3P jedzą; wiedzieć : wiem etc. but wiedzą; and dać : dam etc. but dadzą.
• Pattern 2: -ę ; -ą ; other forms with the same endings as above, but possibly with a different form of the stem than for 1S and 3P. For example:
• *brać :
• *kupić :

• jestem, jesteś, jest; jesteśmy, jesteście, są

• 1S byłem/byłam, 2S byłeś/byłaś, 3S był/była/było, 1P byliśmy/byłyśmy, 2P byliście/byłyście, 3P byli/były.

• Verbs in -eć have past tense in -ał.
• Verbs in -ąć have an alternating vowel, although the alternation does not apply before -em and -eś The explanation for this is that ą shifts to ę only if it is the penultimate syllable of the verb, and in the original uncliticized verb zaczął, ą was part of the final syllable rather than the penultimate like in zaczęła.
• Verbs in -c have a past stem ending with a consonant, related to the present stem, e.g. móc "be able": 1S present mogę, past stem móg-
• Some other verbs also follow the above pattern, i.e. with a stem ending in a consonant. This includes most verbs in -ść and -źć, e.g. nieść : niosłem...niósł...nieśli. The verb iść has the irregular past stem forms szedł/szła/szło, szli/szły. znaleźć and related verbs have forms like znalazł, znaleźli.
• Some verbs in -nąć drop that ending in some or all of their past stems, sometimes optionally. For example, zniknąć has znikł as alternatives to zniknął/zniknęła.

• present adverbial participle, formed from the 3P present tense by adding -c
• present adjectival participle, formed from the present adverbial participle by adding adjectival endings
• past active participle, formed from the past tense by replacing -ł with -wszy, e.g. zabić: zabiwszy "having killed".
• passive participle, in -ny or -ty. The form used depends on the ending of the infinitive: -ać: -any; -eć: -any but with vowel alternation ; -yć/-ić: -ony/-iony but with vowel alternation, or -yty/-ity in verbs with present tense in -yje/-ije, like myć "wash" and bić "beat"; -ąć: -ęty. Verbs with past stem ending in a consonant form the participle from the present tense form, e.g. nieść "carry", pres. niosę,... niesie, past niósł, passive participle niesiony. Note also jeść: jedzony.
• subjectless past tense, formed as the past participle but with the ending -o
• verbal noun, also called the gerund, formed from the past participle with the ending -ie, e.g. śpiewanie. This is a neuter noun.

Prepositions and prefixes

Word formation

• Addition of prefixes to make perfective forms of verbs or to modify the meaning. The prefixes used for this purpose are mostly identical to prepositions. The same prefixes are used for word formation with other parts of speech also.
• Formation of verbs from nouns using the suffix -ować.
• Formation of adjectives from nouns using suffixes such as -owy, -ny, -ski and -i.
• Formation of nouns from adjectives, usually using the suffix -ość.
• Formation of nouns from verbs, usually in -nie, sometimes -cie.
• Formation of nouns from other nouns or other stems, using such suffixes as -nik, -nica, -ec, etc..
• Formation of diminutive forms of nouns, usually using the suffixes -ek/-ka/-ko.