EasyCroatian_r47.an

Easy Croaan (rev. 47b) / 48 Wholes, Parts, Heaps and Pairs 279 / 600
Molim Vas pola . ‘ ’ (i.e. )
®
It’s possible to use parts with nouns in genitive plural, meaning a part of some plural
quantity, possibly the total quantity; then partial quantities get verbs in plural
sometimes:
Pola jabuka G je bilo zrelo N . Half of apples were ripe.
Pola ljudi G su bili žene N . Half of the people were women.
The use of plural in such sentences prevails with people and animals, while singular
is common with other things (apples, stones...).
The generic dio (dijel-) m part can be used with both singular and plural nouns (in
genitive, of course):
Imam dio A jabuke G . I have a part of an apple.
m
Imam dio A jabuka G . I have ‘a part’ of apples. (i.e. a part of some set of apples) m
This is unlike English, where part cannot be used with plural nouns!
The quantity in Croatian has always gender of the quantity-word (neuter for
adverbs). For instance, since dio (dijel-) is masculine, the whole quantity is masculine
singular:
Dio N jabuke G je bio na stolu DL . A part of the apple was on the table.
Dio N ljudi G je plesao. Some people were dancing.
There are two very useful words:
komad piece ® kriška slice
The word komad is very often used, in a similar way as English piece ®. You can have
a piece of something, but all countable, material stuff (e.g. screws) is very often
expressed in pieces:
Jedem komad A kruha G . I’m eating a piece of bread. ®
jesti
(You will maybe occasionally hear the word also stressed as komad.)
The word kriška slice usually gets -i in G-pl, so you would ask:
Molim Vas A deset kriški G šunke G . Ten slices of ham, please.
2pl
(Besides the word kriška for slice, you’ll often hear and read colloquial words šnita
and feta: the former prevails inland, while the latter dominates on the Croatian
coast.)
There are two more useful generic quantity nouns:
manjina minority većina majority, most
These nouns can be used either as measures or on its own:
Većina N ljudi G je gledala utakmicu A . Most people watched the match.
Većina N je gledala utakmicu A . Most watched the match.
m
m