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28 Asking Who and What
Let’s learn how to make simple questions like who is driving? or what do you read?
I’ve explained some simple questions already, but this will explain it deeper.
English has two question words (who and what). Croatian has essentially the same
two words, however they change in cases. Here are forms for the Croatian
equivalent of who:
people
(who)
N A, G DL
tko kog(a) kom(e)
The final a in koga and e in kome can be dropped, but the longer versions are used
quite often. Colloquially, especially in certain regions, tko is simplified to just ko .®
The question-words are placed to the first position and must be put into the exact
case, for instance:
Ivan N je vozio. Ivan was driving (Ivan N)
Tko N je vozio? Who was driving?
For the accusative case (contrasted with the question about the subject in N):
Goran N čeka Anu A . Goran is waiting for Ana. (Anu A)
Koga A Goran N čeka? Who is Goran waiting for? (A)
Tko N čeka Anu A ? Who is waiting for Ana? (N)
English questions could also be written with whom (whom is Goran... ) – that’s
recommended by many use guides, but increasingly rare in real life. You could think
about whom as an almost extinct object case form of who, corresponding to
Croatian A and DL.
Examples for the DL case:
Ana N je pisala Ivanu DL . Ana was writing to Ivan. (Ivanu = DL)
Kome DL je Ana N pisala? Who was Ana writing to?
Knjiga N pripada Ani DL . The book belongs to Ana. (Ani = DL)
Kome DL pripada knjiga N ? Who does the book belong to?
There’s no special placement of verbs or any other words in Croatian questions,
except that the question word must be at the first position.
If you are asking about something that’s obviously not a person, you would use
another question word (I’ve already introduced its nominative form):
things
(what)
N, A DL G
što čemu čega