Czas

Grammar - Gramatyka

Sentence structure

Time of day positioning in the sentence is usually at the beginning:

Jutro odwiedzamy naszą rodzinę	Tomorrow we are visiting our family
Jutro idziemy do szkoły	Tomorrow we are going to school
Dziś po południu piszę książkę	I am writing a book this afternoon
Dzisiaj wieczorem pijemy sok	Tonight we are drinking juice
W piątek słucham muzyki	On Friday I listen to music

But it can also be used at the end when you’re talking about time itself.

Mam czas jutro rano	I have time tomorrow morning
Mam czas po południu	I have time in the afternoon
Masz czas dziś?	Do you have time today?
Kocham piątki!	I love Fridays!

W / We : in / at / on

W is a preposition in Polish that is used to declare a location, and in English it is translated to in/at/on.

Some usages of the “W” preposition, like “We wtorek” are written with "we" instead of "w" so that we don't have to repeat the same w sound twice in a row. However, it’s not only about the repetition of the "w” consonant. For example, “W weekend” is written with "w" because the pronunciation is not the Polish "W" but closer to "Ł". The main rule would be to use “we” if the next word starts with “w” and also has a consonant next to it.

You can read more about this here:
https://www.clozemaster.com/blog/polish-prepositions/

Since “W/we” speaks of location, we use a grammatical case called Locative - Miejscownik.

Accusative - Biernik (on)

Days of the week and weekend are an exception, where in English you would say “on”, it becomes accusative.

W piątek słucham muzyki	On Friday I listen to music
W środę gotujemy obiad	We are cooking lunch on Wednesday
Co robisz w weekend?	What are you doing on the weekend?

Locative - Miejscownik (At / in)

In general, masculine singular nouns can have -e or -u endings depending on the consonant they end with. Neutral nouns have an -e ending, and Feminine nouns also end in -e.

-e/-u

You can read about the detailed rules of the locative case here:
https://mowicpopolsku.com/polish-grammar/cases/locative/

Moja siostra jest w szkole	My sister is at school
W maju one kupują ubrania	They buy clothes in May
W czerwcu nie piję kawy	I don’t drink coffee in June
W listopadzie kupujemy ubrania	We buy clothes in November
W kwietniu jem mięso	I eat meat in April

Exception: W lutym (in February) (it acts as an adjective in locative even though it’s not)

W lutym odwiedzam mojego dziadka

In February I visit my grandfather

Masculine singular

For masculine the locative uses -e and -u endings. When choosing one of these endings the last consonant of masculine form plays a crucial role.

The -e ending works for all masculines ending, for example, with the following consonants:

-b, -d, -f, -ł, -m, -n, -p, -r, -s, -t, -w, -z

A consonant change or softening occurs very often, for example: the ending -t will be replaced by -cie, -d by –dzie, -ł by –le and -r by -rze. Many consonants are softened by -ie, for example: -p (change to -pie), -m (-mie) or -n (-nie).

W listopadzie kupujemy ubrania

We buy clothes in November

Exceptions are the masculine nouns: dom (house), pan (mister) and syn (son), which receive the -u suffix instead of -e during the creation of locative forms:

dom	domu
pan	panu
syn	synu

The ending -u is used among others in the masculine with the following consonants:

-ch/-h, -g, -k, -c, -cz, -dz, -dż, -j, -l, -rz, -sz, -ż, -ć, -dź, -ń, -ś, -ź

Where the soft consonants are softened by -iu. If it ends in -ie before the last consonant, and the previous to last consonant is softened as well, it changes to an equivalent.

Kwiecień	W kwietniu*	In April	*ci -> t
Sierpień	W spierpniu	In August
Wrzesień	W wrześniu*	In September	*si -> ś
Grudzień	W grudniu*	In December	*dz -> d

Neutral singular

Neuter nouns in the locative forms are similar to the masculine nouns, so they receive the -e/-u ending.

As a rule one can (taking all possible changes of consonants and vowels into account) assume that the feminine nouns ending with -o in the locative forms receive -e ending. On the other hand nouns that end with -e or -cho, -go or -ko receive the -u suffix.

Exceptions: there are some exceptions to these rules, for example:

radio – radiu, dobro – dobru, zło – złu

Feminine singular

The locative of feminine nouns is without any exceptions the same as their dative forms. Consequently most of them in the locative have -(i)e ending. The consonant change and softening occurs very often.

Moja siostra jest w szkole

My sister is at school

Locative plural

All feminine, masculine and neuter nouns in the locative receive -ach ending. The feminine form ending with -a will receive shortened, -ch suffix.

Locative Pl. = -ach

Moje jabłka są w pudełkach

My apples are in boxes