4 Kur yra Pilies gatvė? Pilies gatvė yra __________________.
Language points
Cardinal numbers 1–9
Number Masculine Feminine
1 vienas viena
2 du dvi
3 trys trys
4 ketur i ketur ios
5 penk i penk ios
6 šeš i šeš ios
7 septyn i septyn ios
8 aštuon i aštuon ios
9 devyn i devyn ios
Cardinal numbers 1–9 have to match the noun in both gender and case in Lithuanian. If the noun is masculine the number must also be masculine; if a feminine noun is used, the number similarly has to be feminine. For example: vienas bankas , viena parduotuvė . For numbers 4–9, endings are regular: the masculine ending is -i , feminine -ios .
QUICK VOCAB
Starting a conversation
Usually when starting a conversation with a person we know, a close friend or colleague, we ask How are you? In Lithuanian, we ask:
Kaip (tu) gyveni? (informal) Kaip (jūs) gyvenate? (formal) Kaip sekasi? (neutral)
We react to this question by saying:
gerai fi ne neblogai not bad!
šiaip sau so so!
blogai not too good/pretty bad (we say this to a close person only when we want to tell him/her what has happened)
Goodbye
Th ere are many ways to say ‘goodbye’ in an informal or neutral way in Lithuanian:
iki! (informal)
viso labo , viso gero , iki pasimatymo , sudie (neutral)
When saying goodbye at night or late in the evening or when going to bed:
labanakt or labanaktis! good night!
It is becoming more and more popular to say ‘good day’ in a formal situation. Th is is also the way in which a cashier says goodbye to a client:
geros dienos!
gero vakaro!
More about noun gender
In Unit 1, you learned what ending masculine and feminine nouns usually take. In this unit, you will learn a little more about it. Some nouns may have two variants of ending: both a soft and a hard one. Th e soft ness is indicated by -i- written before the ending:
-as, - i as miestas, kel i as -us, - i us turgus, televizor i us -a, - i a mokykla, bažnyč i a
When declining these words, the ending of both types is usually the same but not necessarily all the time. For this reason, in following units, where cases are presented, both types will be given.
In most cases, the gender of nouns can be distinguished quite easily according to the endings in the nominative case, but it is not quite like that all the time. One ending of nominative -is may be for both masculine and feminine nouns. Gender is distinguished only by the ending of the genitive case. Masculine nouns have the genitive ending -io and feminine -ies :
Nominative Genitive Masculine šaligatv is šaligatv io
Feminine stot is stot ies
Th roughout this book this type of word will always show the genitive ending in order to be able to distinguish the gender.
Asking and giving directions
To express direction in Lithuanian, we use a preposition į and accusative case of the noun. Th e accusative case is formed simply by dropping the last -s from the masculine noun and adding a ‘tail’ to the vowel ( ą , į , ų );
in feminine nouns, it is enough to add a ‘tail’ ( ą , ę , į ) (if the last letter is ė , it simply changes into ę ).
Accusative We use the accusative case when we want to express direction when going to somebody’s place (house, apartment etc.); we use the preposition pas + accusative case of noun, for example:
Aš einu pas ponią Ireną. I am going to Miss Irena’s (place).
Važiuojame pas Vytautą. We are going to Vytautas’ place.
Direction can also be expressed by adverbs of place:
tiesiai straight forward, straight ahead
When we want to express a completed action in Lithuanian, we add various prefi xes to the verb, for example in pasakyti , pasukti there is a prefi x pa- , one of the most popular prefi xes, meaning a result. Sometimes these prefi xes have a supplementary meaning: not only that of the result – e.g. with movement verbs they also imply direction. Th e verbs in this unit nueiti , nuvažiuoti have a prefi x nu- , which has a meaning of moving away . One opposite is the prefi x at- , e.g. atvažiuoti , which shows direction towards , closer to the speaker. In the third dialogue in this unit, we saw the verb pereiti with a prefi x per- , which has the meaning of crossing over something. As you learn Lithuanian it is extremely important to memorize which prefi x fi ts with which verb to mean completed action, because there are not many regular instances and prefi xes may, in many cases, change the meaning of the verb itself quite radically, therefore misunderstandings can occur. So watch out for verbal prefi xes!
Where? and indicating place
Th e question word of place is kur? , for example:
Kur yra parduotuvė? Where is the shop?
Kur yra ligoninė? Where is the hospital?
Th ere are many ways in which to express place in Lithuanian and it even uses a special case called the locative . Th is has a meaning of location, place inside or some wider space. Locative never means ‘into’ or ‘to’
(direction) and is never used with verbs of motion. We form the locative case by changing the nominative case ending of the noun into the locative case ending.
Masculine
Sing. nom.
(kas?)
-as, -ias
-is -ys -us, -ius -uo
Sing. loc.
(kur? kame?)
-e, -yje -yje -yje -uje, -iuje -en-yje
Masculine
Place can also be expressed by adverbs of place:
čia – ten here – there toli, netoli far, not far arti close
How to indicate ‘close by/to’ a place
Th ere are many ways of saying ‘close by/to’. Most oft en we use a preposition prie + genitive case: prie pašto ( close to/near the post offi ce ), prie mokyklos ( near the school ), prie kavinės ( close by a cafe ), prie turgaus ( near the market ).
Telephone numbers
When we want to fi nd out somebody’s phone number, we ask Koks tavo/
jūsų telefono numeris? We reply with masculine cardinal numerals.
You can arrange them in groups but you can also say them one by one, i.e. you can say either ‘fourteen’ or ‘one, four’:
2687214 du, šeši, aštuoni, septyni, du, vienas, keturi
How to express time when asked kada?/when?
To ask about the time something is happening we use kada? Th ere are a few ways to answer this kind of question. We can use adverbs of time:
dabar now šiandien today vakar yesterday rytoj tomorrow
poryt the day after tomorrow visada always
niekada never kartais sometimes dažnai often retai rarely
We may also answer a question in kada? by using the accusative case of the noun:
Nominative Accusative
rytas rytą in the morning diena dieną in the daytime, by day naktis naktį at/by night
pavasaris pavasarį in spring vasara vasarą in summer žiema žiemą in winter ruduo rudenį in autumn
But when we use vakare ( in the evening ) we have to use the locative:
vakaras – vakare Imperative
In Lithuanian, we use the imperative forms of the verb to give commands.
Th is is not a complicated procedure. You take the dictionary form of the
verb (infi nitive), remove -ti and add imperative marker -k for 2nd person singular (informal):
ei-ti eik! go!
kalbė-ti kalbėk! talk!
susto-ti sustok! stop!
For plural add: -kime , -kite : eikim(e)! let’s go (we) eikit(e) go! (you)
In spoken Lithuanian, the fi nal -e is usually omitted.
Insight
Lithuania’s population totals 3,333,000 people, nearly three-quarters of whom live in urban areas. Vilnius (pop. 560,170), the capital of Lithuania, is the largest and one of the oldest cities in the country. Its name is fi rst mentioned in 1323 in the letters of the Lithuanian Grand Duke Gediminas inviting craft smen, merchants and monks from western Europe to come and stay here. Vilnius has always been a multiethnic, multilingual and multicultural city. Percentage wise, 57.8%
of Vilnius’ inhabitants are Lithuanians, 18.7% are Poles, 14% Russians, 4% Byelorussians, 0.5% Jews and the remaining 5% comprise other nationalities. Th e Old Town, which is the historical centre of Vilnius, is one of the largest in eastern Europe (360 ha). Th e most valuable historic and cultural heritage is concentrated here. Th e buildings in the Old Town – and there are about 1,500 of them! – were built across various centuries, so there is a grand mixture of many European architectural styles. Although Vilnius is oft en called a baroque city, here you will fi nd some buildings in the gothic, renaissance and other styles.
Th e main sights of the city are Gediminas Castle and Cathedral Square, both symbols of the capital. Th eir combination is also a gateway to the historic centre of the capital. Because of its uniqueness, the Old Town of Vilnius was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List.
Some other major cities in Lithuania are Kaunas, Klaipėda, Šiauliai, Panevėžys and Alytus.
Insight
1 Cardinal numbers 1–9 have to match the noun in both gender