Dialogue: Shopping in a Shop

A two-line exchange at the bakery counter quietly drills the hardest piece of Czech numeral grammar there is: what case the thing you're counting goes into. In deset rohlíků ("ten rolls") the noun is forced into the genitive plural, but in dvě housky ("two buns") it is not — and that cliff between four and five has no parallel in English, where "two rolls" and "ten rolls" look identical. This page reads the dialogue word by word and turns the counting rules into something you can apply to anything you ever buy.

The dialogue

Zákazník: Chtěl bych deset rohlíků, dvě housky a kilo jablek. Prodavačka: To je sto dvacet korun.

The customer (zákazník) places the order; the shop assistant (prodavačka) gives the price. Naturally: "I'd like ten rolls, two buns, and a kilo of apples. — That'll be a hundred and twenty crowns."

Word by word

Line 1 — Chtěl bych deset rohlíků, dvě housky a kilo jablek.

• Chtěl bych — "I'd like," the polite conditional: the -l participle chtěl (from chtít, "to want") plus the conditional clitic bych. A female customer says chtěla bych. This is the courteous way to order, softer than the blunt chci ("I want").
• deset — "ten," a numeral of the five-and-above class.
• rohlíků — genitive plural of rohlík (the crescent-shaped roll, a Czech staple): rohlík → rohlíků. Forced by deset.
• dvě — "two," in the feminine/neuter form. It is dvě (not dva) because houska is feminine.
• housky — houska ("bun, soft roll"), here nominative/accusative plural, not genitive. The numerals two, three and four keep their noun in the plural agreeing case — dvě housky, not dvě housek.
• a — "and."
• kilo — "a kilo," a neuter measure word that stays unchanged here. Like any quantity word, it governs the genitive of what is measured.
• jablek — genitive plural of jablko ("apple"): jablko → jablek. "A kilo of apples."

Line 2 — To je sto dvacet korun.

• To — "that," neuter demonstrative, the dummy subject of the price formula.
• je — "is" (být, 3rd singular). To je… = "that is / that comes to…".
• sto dvacet — "a hundred and twenty" (120): sto "hundred" + dvacet "twenty."
• korun — genitive plural of koruna ("crown," the currency): koruna → korun. The number is in the five-and-above bracket, so the currency noun goes genitive plural.

Grammar in action

The big rule: a quantity demands the genitive plural

This is the single most important counting fact in Czech. Any quantity word of five or more — and every measure word — puts the counted noun into the genitive plural. English just sticks an -s on ("ten rolls," "a kilo of apples"); Czech changes the whole ending.

Many of these genitive plurals have a zero ending — the bare stem with no suffix, sometimes with a vowel slipped in to break up the consonants: koruna → korun, jablko → jablek, houska → housek, pivo → piv. That vowel-insertion (jabl-e-k) is covered on the zero-ending genitive plural.

The cliff between four and five

The genitive-plural rule does not apply to two, three and four. These three numerals keep the noun in the same case as the numeral — here nominative/accusative plural. So you get a clean break:

That is why dvě housky (plural agreeing) sits right next to deset rohlíků (genitive plural) in the same breath. Cross the line from four to five and the ending jumps. See numerals five-and-up with the genitive.

Dvě or dva? The gendered "two"

Czech marks gender on only the first two numerals. For two, the masculine form is dva and the feminine/neuter form is dvě:

So the customer says dvě housky (feminine) but would say dva rohlíky (masculine) and dvě jablka (neuter). One is jeden/jedna/jedno; three and up no longer care about gender. Choosing between the forms is laid out on dva vs dvě.

The price formula: To je… korun

Prices are quoted with the neat impersonal frame To je… ("that is / that comes to"), or in speech To bude… and To dělá… ("that'll be / that makes"). The amount of crowns still obeys the counting rule — sto dvacet korun uses the genitive plural korun because the final operative number, dvacet (20), is in the five-and-up class. The everyday currency phrasing is on money and currency and the wider shopping repertoire on shopping and money.

Usage note

In a real obchod or at a pekárna (bakery) counter you'll open with either the plain Dám si… ("I'll have…") or the more deferential Chtěl/Chtěla bych… — both polite, the conditional just a touch softer. The participle must match your own gender: a man says chtěl bych, a woman chtěla bych. When the assistant quotes To je sto dvacet, the word korun is often dropped in casual speech because everyone knows the currency — but it's still grammatically genitive plural when present. And keep your ear on the four-to-five cliff: it returns every single time you count, so internalising dvě housky / pět housek now pays off at every counter for the rest of your Czech life.

Common Mistakes

Key Takeaways

• Quantity = genitive plural. Any number from five up, plus every measure word (kilo, mnoho, půl), forces the counted noun into the genitive plural: deset rohlíků, kilo jablek, sto dvacet korun.
• Two, three, four are different: they keep the noun in the plural agreeing case — dvě housky, čtyři rohlíky — so there's a sharp cliff between four and five.
• Gendered "two": dva for masculine (dva rohlíky), dvě for feminine and neuter (dvě housky, dvě jablka).
• Many genitive plurals are zero-ending, often with an inserted vowel: koruna → korun, jablko → jablek, houska → housek.
• Prices use the impersonal To je / To bude / To dělá… korun, with the currency still in the genitive plural.