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Easy Croaan (rev. 47b) / 61 Cake is Eaten: Passive Adjecves 356 / 60061 Cake is Eaten: Passive AdjectivesEnglish is well-known for reusing various verb forms. For instance, the same word(eaten) has two quite different meanings in the following sentences:Ana has eaten. (what she did)The cake is eaten. (state of the cake)Croatian has a different approach – each meaning has a different word. Wordscorresponding to the second meaning – adjectives for what happened to somethingor someone are called passive adjectives.Passive adjectives are verb forms, but not all verbs have a meaningful pass.adjective. Verbs that cannot have an object (e.g. sleep – you cannot sleepsomething) won’t have an adjective that’s really used.There are some verbs (and verb pairs) that can have an object, but their pass.adjective is never used. Some of them are:čuti (čuje) hearhtjeti (hoće +,...) wantimati haveosjećati ~ osjetiti feelrazumjeti (razumije,...) understandIt’s difficult to explain why the pass. adj. of razumjeti (...) isn’t used, while the pass.adj. of shvatiti perf., a verb with a very similar meaning, is used. Likewise, željeti(želi, želio, željela) wish, desire has a used pass. adj., but htjeti (...) doesn’t!Likewise, there’s no pass. adj. from verbs that don’t use objects in A, such asuspijevati («) ~ uspjeti (uspije,...) succeed and similar ones.Passive adjectives can be made for both impf. and perf. verbs. However, since perf.verbs indicate that the action is complete, pass. adjectives made from them are usedmore often. In fact, pass. adjectives of most impf. verbs are not used at all, or areextremely rare. The following impf. verbs have pass. adjectives that are frequentlyused in speech:čistiti cleančitati readčuvati keepgledati watchgraditi buildkoristiti usekuhati cookočekivati (očekuje) expectpeći (peče,…) bakepratiti followpržiti frynositi carry/wearvoljeti (voli,…) loveželjeti (želi,…) wish, desireIt’s worth knowing that Croatian has one more way of expressing passive,introduced in 64 The Door Opens: Fun with se², with less restrictions.
Easy Croaan (rev. 47b) / 61 Cake is Eaten: Passive Adjecves 357 / 600All passive adjectives in Croatian end in either -n (a vast majority) or -t. Always keepin mind that they are real adjectives, that is, they must adapt to gender, case andnumber.For regular verbs that have infinitive ending in -ati, it’s really simple to make a pass.adjective, just replace -ati with -an:verbgledati watchnapisati (napiše) perf. writeposlati (pošalje) perf. sendpass. adj.gledan watchednapisan writtenposlan sentAs you can see, even verbs that have a bit irregular pres-3 follow this simple patternif their inf ends in -ati.Since these words are adjectives, they adapt to nouns as any other adjectives do.For example:Pismo N je napisano N i poslano N . The letter is written and sent.For verbs that don’t have infinitives in -ati, the rules are more complicated.For most verbs that have pres-3 ending in -e, their pass. adjective is simply made byadding -n to the pres-3 (I have omitted all past forms for clarity):verbnaći (nađe) perf. findpeći (peče) bakepojesti (pojede) perf. eatplesti (plete) knitpass. adj.nađen foundpečen bakedpojeden eatenpleten knittedFinally we can say:Kolač N je pojeden N . The cake is eaten.Since this adjective is derived from a perfective verb, it’s implied that the cake is nomore.For verbs that have pres-3 ending in -i – and there are many such verbs – the -i isremoved and -en is added. Unless they are Croatian-specific or an r, consonantsbefore -en get changed, e.g. t is changed to ć (I have again omitted all past forms forclarity):
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Easy Croaan (rev. 47b) / 61 Cake is Eaten: Passive Adjecves 356 / 600
61 Cake is Eaten: Passive Adjectives
English is well-known for reusing various verb forms. For instance, the same word
(eaten) has two quite different meanings in the following sentences:
Ana has eaten. (what she did)
The cake is eaten. (state of the cake)
Croatian has a different approach – each meaning has a different word. Words
corresponding to the second meaning – adjectives for what happened to something
or someone are called passive adjectives.
Passive adjectives are verb forms, but not all verbs have a meaningful pass.
adjective. Verbs that cannot have an object (e.g. sleep – you cannot sleep
something) won’t have an adjective that’s really used.
There are some verbs (and verb pairs) that can have an object, but their pass.
adjective is never used. Some of them are:
čuti (čuje) hear
htjeti (hoće +,...) want
imati have
osjećati ~ osjetiti feel
razumjeti (razumije,...) understand
It’s difficult to explain why the pass. adj. of razumjeti (...) isn’t used, while the pass.
adj. of shvatiti perf., a verb with a very similar meaning, is used. Likewise, željeti
(želi, želio, željela) wish, desire has a used pass. adj., but htjeti (...) doesn’t!
Likewise, there’s no pass. adj. from verbs that don’t use objects in A, such as
uspijevati («) ~ uspjeti (uspije,...) succeed and similar ones.
Passive adjectives can be made for both impf. and perf. verbs. However, since perf.
verbs indicate that the action is complete, pass. adjectives made from them are used
more often. In fact, pass. adjectives of most impf. verbs are not used at all, or are
extremely rare. The following impf. verbs have pass. adjectives that are frequently
used in speech:
čistiti clean
čitati read
čuvati keep
gledati watch
graditi build
koristiti use
kuhati cook
očekivati (očekuje) expect
peći (peče,…) bake
pratiti follow
pržiti fry
nositi carry/wear
voljeti (voli,…) love
željeti (želi,…) wish, desire
It’s worth knowing that Croatian has one more way of expressing passive,
introduced in 64 The Door Opens: Fun with se², with less restrictions.
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