Slovak language

Syntax

The main features of Slovak syntax are:

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• The verb (predicate) agrees in person and number with its subject ? just like for example in German, Slavic and Romance languages, for example:

:Spevá?ka spieva. (The+woman+singer is+singing.)

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:(Spevá?k-a spieva-0, where -0 is a third person singular ending)

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:Spevá?ky spievajú. (The+woman+singers are+singing.)

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:(Spevá?k-y spieva-j-ú, where -ú is a third person plural ending, -j- is a hiatus sound)

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:My spevá?ky spievame. (We the+woman+singers are+singing.)

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:(My spevá?k-y spieva-me, where -me is the first person plural ending)

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:and so forth.

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• An adjective, pronoun and partly also a numeral agrees in person, gender and case with the noun it refers to (see Slovak declension) ? just like in most Slavic languages.
• An adjective always precedes the corresponding noun ? as in English, unlike in Polish and Romance languages. Botanic or zoological terms are exceptions (for example, ma?ka divá, literally "cat wild", Felis silvestris).

The word order is relatively free (unlike in English or French), because ? as opposed to English ? the strong inflection of the words enables to identify the role of a word (subject, object, predicate, etc.) regardless of its placement within the sentence. The relatively free word order enables the Slovaks (just like other Slavs) to use the word order to convey information on which information is considered most important or new: Constituents with old information precede constituents with new information, or those that carry most emphasis.

Related Topics:
French - Inflection - Slavs

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Examples:

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:Ten ve?ký ?lovek tam dnes otvára obchod. = The big man opens a store there today. (Ten = The; ve?ky´ = big; ?lovek = man; tam = there; dnes = today; otvára = opens; obchod = store)

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:Ten ve?ký ?lovek dnes otvára obchod tam. = It is there that the big man opens a store today.

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:Dnes tam otvára obchod ten ve?ký ?lovek. = It is the big man who opens a store there today.

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:Obchod tam dnes otvára ten ve?ký ?lovek. = As for the store, it is opened there by the big man.

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However, the normal order is Subject-Verb-Object (as in English) and the word order is not completely arbitrary.

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For example, in the above example, the following combinations are not possible:

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:Ten otvára ve?ký ?lovek tam dnes obchod.

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:Obchod ?lovek tam ten ve?ký dnes otvára. ...

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And the following, for instance, are not likely to occur:

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:Otvára ten ve?ký ?lovek tam dnes obchod.

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:Obchod ten ve?ký ?lovek dnes tam otvára. ...

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