Breakdown of Jesu li se rodili u dvadesetom stoljeću?
biti
to be (sam, si, je)
li
question particle
u
in, into
dvadeseti
twentieth
Questions & Answers about Jesu li se rodili u dvadesetom stoljeću?
Since the current lesson is about using the genitive for years, why isn't 'twentieth century' in the genitive case here?
When stating a specific year, Croatian uses the genitive case without a preposition. However, when talking about a century, you use the preposition u (in) followed by the locative case. That is why we say u dvadesetom stoljeću instead of using the genitive.
Why is it Jesu li instead of just starting with Su li?
When forming a yes/no question with li, you must use the long, or full, form of the helping verb. The short form for 'they are' is su, but its long form is jesu. You cannot start a sentence with the short form su, so Jesu li is the correct way to ask 'Were they' in the past tense here.
Why do we need the word se in this sentence?
How do we build the word for 'twentieth' from the number twenty?