How to Use Possessive Pronouns and Adjectives in Croatian

Understanding Possessive Pronouns and Adjectives in Croatian

In Croatian, possessive pronouns and adjectives are used to indicate ownership or association, similar to English. However, they agree in gender, number, and case with the noun they modify or replace, which is different from English where possessive pronouns do not change form.

What Are Possessive Pronouns and Adjectives?

Possessive adjectives describe a noun by showing to whom it belongs, for example, "my book" or "your house." Possessive pronouns replace the noun entirely, such as "mine" or "yours." In Croatian, the forms change depending on the gender (masculine, feminine, neuter), number (singular, plural), and grammatical case of the noun.

Croatian Possessive Adjectives

Croatian possessive adjectives are derived from personal pronouns and change according to the noun they describe. Here are the basic forms in the nominative singular:

• my - moj (m), moja (f), moje (n)
• your (singular) - tvoj (m), tvoja (f), tvoje (n)
• his - njegov (m), njegova (f), njegovo (n)
• her - njezin (m), njezina (f), njezino (n)
• our - naš (m), naša (f), naše (n)
• your (plural) - vaš (m), vaša (f), vaše (n)
• their - njihov (m), njihova (f), njihovo (n)

Note that the endings change to match the gender of the noun they modify. For example, "my book" is "moja knjiga" (feminine), but "my car" is "moj auto" (masculine).

Croatian Possessive Pronouns

Possessive pronouns in Croatian replace the noun and agree in gender, number, and case. They are often formed by adding the suffix -i or -e to the possessive adjective, but their forms vary.

Examples in nominative singular:

• mine - moj (m), moja (f), moje (n)
• yours (singular) - tvoj (m), tvoja (f), tvoje (n)
• his - njegov (m), njegova (f), njegovo (n)
• hers - njezin (m), njezina (f), njezino (n)
• ours - naš (m), naša (f), naše (n)
• yours (plural) - vaš (m), vaša (f), vaše (n)
• theirs - njihov (m), njihova (f), njihovo (n)

In many cases, the possessive pronoun looks the same as the possessive adjective but is used without a following noun. For example, "This book is mine" translates to "Ova knjiga je moja."

Examples in Sentences

Here are some examples to illustrate the use of possessive adjectives and pronouns in Croatian:

• This is my house. - Ovo je moja kuća.
• Is this your car? - Je li ovo tvoj auto?
• His dog is big. - Njegov pas je velik.
• Her cat is small. - Njezin mačak je mali.
• Our friends are here. - Naši prijatelji su ovdje.
• This book is mine. - Ova knjiga je moja.
• The keys are yours. - Ključevi su tvoji.

Important Notes on Agreement and Cases

Croatian is a highly inflected language, so possessive pronouns and adjectives change form depending on the grammatical case (nominative, genitive, dative, accusative, vocative, locative, instrumental). This means you need to learn the declension patterns to use them correctly in different contexts.

For example, the masculine singular possessive adjective "moj" (my) changes as follows in some cases:

• Nominative: moj (e.g., moj pas - my dog)
• Genitive: mog (e.g., bez mog psa - without my dog)
• Dative: mom (e.g., dam mom psu - I give to my dog)
• Accusative: mog/moga (animate/inanimate)
• Instrumental: mojim (e.g., s mojim psom - with my dog)