Serbian 401 — send, help, bring, give, write. Five verbs, one case, twenty short commands.
English hides the case here, and that's exactly what makes these hard. Help me and thank him look like direct objects — but in Serbian both are datives: pomozi mi, hvala mu.
| English looks like… | Serbian actually is |
|---|---|
| help me | pomozi mi — dativ |
| thank him | hvala mu — dativ |
| write to her | piši joj — dativ |
| bring them | donesi im — dativ |
Hvala is not a verb at all — it's a noun, and the person you're thanking goes into the dative around it. That's why hvala ti and hvala vam differ: one is a friend, the other is a stranger or a room full of people.
The imperatives are worth collecting as forms in their own right: poslati → pošalji, pomoći → pomozi, doneti → donesi, dati → daj, pisati → piši. None of them are predictable from the infinitive, so learn the pair.
1. send him →
2. send her →
3. send them →
1. help me →
2. help him →
3. help her →
4. help them →
1. bring me →
2. bring him →
3. bring her →
4. bring them →
1. give him →
2. thank him →
3. thank her →
4. thank them →
5. thank you (informal) →
1. write to me →
2. write to him →
3. write to her →
4. write to them →
SR (lat): Upiši i glagol i zamenicu. Može latinicom ili ćirilicom; dijakritici su opcioni.
СР (ћир): Упиши и глагол и заменицу. Може латиницом или ћирилицом; дијакритици су опциони.
EN: Type both the verb and the pronoun. Latin or Cyrillic, diacritics optional.
From grammar to a whole profession — the vocabulary of a job that rings at three in the morning.
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