Breakdown of Stare zgrade i ulice su lijepe.
biti
to be (sam, si, je)
lijep
beautiful
i
and (additive)
ulica
street
Questions & Answers about Stare zgrade i ulice su lijepe.
What is the singular form of zgrade and ulice, and how do they become plural?
The singular forms are zgrada (building) and ulica (street). Because they are regular feminine nouns ending in -a, they change that -a to an -e to form the nominative plural.
Why do the adjectives stare and lijepe also end in -e?
In Croatian, adjectives must match the noun they describe in gender, number, and case. Since the nouns here are feminine plural, the adjectives take the feminine plural ending -e (changing from their singular forms, stara and lijepa).
Why is the verb su (are) placed after ulice instead of being the second word in the sentence?
The word su is an enclitic, which is a weak word that usually takes the second position in a sentence. However, the second position can mean after the first word or after the first complete phrase. Here, the entire subject Stare zgrade i ulice acts as a single block of information in the first position, so su comes right after it.
Why is there no word for "The" at the beginning of the Croatian sentence?
Croatian does not have definite articles (like "the") or indefinite articles (like "a" or "an"). The phrase Stare zgrade can mean either "Old buildings" or "The old buildings" depending on what makes sense in context.