Breakdown of Njezina unuka je pametna.
biti
to be (sam, si, je)
pametan
smart
njezin
her
unuka
granddaughter
Questions & Answers about Njezina unuka je pametna.
Why is the word for "her" njezina and not just njezin?
Possessive words act like adjectives, so they must match the gender of the noun they describe. Because unuka (granddaughter) is a feminine noun, the base word njezin takes the feminine ending -a to become njezina.
If the sentence was "his granddaughter", how would the possessive word change?
The base word for "his" is njegov. Just like before, you must add the feminine ending -a to match the feminine noun unuka. So "his granddaughter" is njegova unuka. The base word changes based on the owner's gender, but the ending changes based on the gender of the person or thing being owned!
I have seen njena used for "her" before. Is that correct too?
Yes! The base word njen (and its feminine form njena) is a shorter alternative to njezin / njezina. They mean the exact same thing, and you can use either one to say "her granddaughter": njena unuka or njezina unuka.
The verb je is the third word here. Doesn't it have to be the second word in the sentence?
Short verb forms like je (called enclitics) usually go in the second position of a sentence. However, a "position" doesn't always mean a single word. Here, Njezina unuka acts together as one single block of meaning (the subject). The verb je naturally sits right after this whole block.
Why is the adjective pametna instead of pametan?
It must match the feminine noun unuka. The dictionary form (masculine) is pametan. When changing it to feminine, it drops the "fleeting a" from the middle and adds the regular feminine -a at the end, becoming pametna.
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