Czech pronouns
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Personal Pronouns
| 1st Person | 2nd Person | 3rd Person Mas. | 3rd Person Fem. | 3rd Person Neuter | |
| Nominative | já | ty | on | ona | ono |
| Genitive | mne, mě | tebe, tě | jeho/něho, ho, jej/něj | jí/ní | jeho/něho, ho, jej/něj |
| Dative | mně, mi | tobě, ti | jemu/němu, mu | jí/ní | jemu/němu, mu |
| Accusative | mne, mě | tebe, tě | jeho/něho, ho, jej/něj | ji/ni | je/ně, ho, jej/něj |
| Vocative | ---- | ---- | ---- | ---- | ---- |
| Locative | mně | tobě | něm | ní | něm |
| Instrumental | mnou | tebou | jím/ním | jí/ní | jím/ním |
| 1st Person | 2nd Person | 3rd Person Mas. | 3rd Person Fem. | 3rd Person Neuter | |
| Nominative | my | vy | oni/ony | ony | ona |
| Genitive | nás | vás | jich/nich | ||
| Dative | nám | vám | jim/nim | ||
| Accusative | nás | vás | je/ně | ||
| Vocative | ---- | ---- | ---- | ||
| Locative | nás | vás | nich | ||
| Instrumental | námi | vámi | jimi/nimi | ||
In the first person singular, there is no difference in pronunciation of mně/mě. These two forms differ only in their written form – you write mě in genitive and accusative, whereas in dative and locative you write mně. (Because the pronunciation of mně/mě is the same, it is difficult to write them correctly for little children. As it`s normal to use numbers of cases instead of their names in Czech, pupils are tought to write 2-lettered mě in the 2nd and the 4th case; and 3-lettered mně in the 3rd and the 6th case.)
Third person masculine plural has in nominative animate form oni and inanimate form ony. The inflected forms for third person plural are the same in masculine, feminine and neuter.
As you can see, some pronouns have more possible inflected variants. These can`t be used at random, there are several rules about their usage:
1) If there is a choice between longer and shorter form in the inflected pronouns, you use the longer form
- if you want to emphasize the pronoun:
- Zeptám se ho (I`ll ask him). Zeptám se jeho (I`ll ask noone else but him).
- Mám rád jenom tebe (I love only you). Mám tě rád (I love you).
- after a preposition
- Dej mně/mi to (Give it to me). Půjdeme ke mně
ke mi(Let`s go to my place, literally Let`s go to me). - Dám mu to na stůl. Dám to k němu na stůl. ( These two sentences have he same meaning – I`ll give it at his desk, literally I`ll give it to him at desk – only in one sentence there is a preposition, while in the other there`s none.)
- at the beginning of a sentence
- Jeho vidím. Vidím ho. (Putting a pronoun at the beginning of the sentence is also kind of its emphasizing: Vidím ho = I can see him. Jeho vidím = It is him whom I can see.)
- Tebe nemám rád (It`s you whom I don`t like) . Nemám tě rád (I don`t like you).
Regarding this rule, mne/mě are interchangible, as well as něho/něj.
Ode mne/ode mě nic nedostaneš (You won`t be given anything from me). Zeptal se mne/mě na to (He asked me about it).
Dostal jsem od něho/od něj dárek (I`ve been given a present from him. Attention – něho/něj can be used only with prepositions).
2) The third person has in all the inflected cases except for locative two variants – one beginning with j, one beginning with n. You have to use the n-form after prepositions. Locative can be used exclusively with a preposition, so it has the n-form only.
Přijdeme bez něho/bez něj (We`ll come without him).
Nepozveme ho (We won`t invite him). Jeho nepozveme (as if indicating We may invite many people, but definitaly not him).
3) In third person singular, jej and je, as rather bookish forms, are used rarely in spoken language.
In accusative of third person masculine you should in standard Czech distinguish between animate (jeho, něho, jej, něj) and inanimate (jej, něj, ho) form. Hardly any Czech does so. It`s normal to form the accusative in spoken language the following way:
masculine animate – jeho, něho/něj, ho (long form, prepositional form, short form)
masculine inanimate – něho/něj, ho (prepositional form, short form)
Does it seem difficult? Just try to remember two basic things:
- In third person there are non-prepositional j-forms and prepositional n-forms.
- In singular, in genitive, dative and accusative may exist longer forms used at the beginning of a sentence/with prepositions, and shorter forms used in the other cases.
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