Breakdown of Prijateljice su se smijale i slavile.
biti
to be (sam, si, je)
i
and (additive)
prijateljica
friend (f)
slaviti
to celebrate
smijati se
to laugh
Questions & Answers about Prijateljice su se smijale i slavile.
Why do both past tense verbs, smijale and slavile, end in -le?
In the Croatian past tense, the main action word (the l-participle) changes its ending to match the gender and number of the subject. Because Prijateljice (female friends) is a feminine plural noun, both verbs take the feminine plural ending -le.
The sentence means 'laughed and celebrated'. Why isn't there another su before slavile?
When you join two past tense verbs with i (and) for the exact same subject, you only need to use the helper verb su once. The single su applies to both smijale and slavile.
Does the word se belong to both smijale and slavile?
No, it only belongs to smijale. The dictionary form of 'to laugh' is smijati se, which is a reflexive verb and always needs the word se. 'To celebrate' is just slaviti, so it doesn't use se.
Why do su and se come right after Prijateljice instead of being grouped with the verb smijale?
Both su and se are enclitics — short words without their own stress. Croatian grammar rules strictly require them to go in the second position in a sentence. Here, the subject Prijateljice takes the first spot, so the enclitics line up immediately behind it.
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