Breakdown of Želite li platiti karticom ili gotovinom?
li
question particle
željeti
to want
platiti
to pay
ili
or
Questions & Answers about Želite li platiti karticom ili gotovinom?
Why are karticom and gotovinom used here instead of their dictionary forms?
They are in the instrumental case. In Croatian, when you talk about the tool, means, or method you use to do something (like paying by card or in cash), you use the instrumental case without any preposition.
Why isn't there a Croatian word for 'by' or 'with' (like s or sa) before the payment methods?
When the instrumental case is used to show the means or instrument used to complete an action, you never use the preposition s or sa. You only use those prepositions when talking about company, which means doing something 'together with' someone or something.
How do we form the instrumental case for words like kartica and gotovina?
Both are regular feminine nouns ending in -a. To form the instrumental case, you simply drop the -a and add the ending -om. This turns kartica into karticom and gotovina into gotovinom.
The English translation says 'Do you want to', so why does the Croatian sentence start with Želite li?
In Croatian, a common and polite way to ask a yes/no question is to put the verb first, followed immediately by the question particle li. You could also say Da li želite, but Želite li is considered more elegant and standard.