Learn Hardcore Croatian: Vikend smo proveli u gradu. - We spent the weekend in the city.

Why does the sentence start with Vikend instead of Proveli smo? Is Vikend smo proveli u gradu different from Proveli smo vikend u gradu?

Both are correct and mean the same thing in basic terms:

Vikend smo proveli u gradu.
Proveli smo vikend u gradu.

The difference is nuance and emphasis:

Vikend smo proveli u gradu.
– Puts vikend first, so you’re thematically focusing on “the weekend” (for example, contrasting this weekend with some other time). It’s a typical way to highlight or “topicalize” the weekend.
Proveli smo vikend u gradu.
– More neutral, closer to standard English word order (“We spent the weekend in the city”). Emphasis more naturally falls on proveli (the action).

Croatian word order is relatively flexible, and fronting vikend is natural, especially in spoken language, when you want to stress when you did something.

Why is vikend not declined? Shouldn’t it change form in the accusative?

It is declined here; it’s just that the nominative and accusative singular forms look the same.

Nominative singular (dictionary form): vikend – “weekend”
Accusative singular (direct object, masculine inanimate): vikend – also “vikend”

In this sentence, vikend is the direct object of proveli (“spent”), so it is in the accusative singular. It just happens that for masculine inanimate nouns like grad, vikend, etc., nominative and accusative singular are identical in form.

What is the role of smo in Vikend smo proveli u gradu? Why do we need it?

Smo is the 1st person plural form of the auxiliary verb biti (“to be”) used to build the past tense (perfect):

ja sam proveo / provela – I spent
ti si proveo / provela – you spent
on je proveo / ona je provela – he/she spent
mi smo proveli – we spent
vi ste proveli – you (pl.) spent
oni su proveli – they spent

In Vikend smo proveli u gradu, the actual “lexical” verb is proveli; smo just forms the past tense with it.
Without smo, the sentence would be ungrammatical: ✗ Vikend proveli u gradu is wrong.

Why is the verb in the form proveli and not something like proveli smo as a single word? What does proveli itself express?

Proveli is the past participle (also called the “l-participle”) of the verb provesti (“to spend” time).

provesti – perfective infinitive, “to spend (finished, one-time event)”
proveli – masculine plural past participle, agreeing with mi (we)

In Croatian past tense, you combine:

The auxiliary biti in the present: smo (we are)
The past participle: proveli

So:

mi smo proveli – we spent
one su provele – they (all female) spent
on je proveo – he spent

The participle changes for gender and number, the auxiliary changes for person and number.

Why is proveli in the masculine plural form when “we” could refer to a mixed or unknown group?

In Croatian, past participles must agree in gender and number with the (implicit) subject:

mi smo proveli – we (masculine or mixed group) spent
mi smo provele – we (all female) spent

If the group is mixed (males + females) or gender is not specified, Croatian defaults to masculine plural.
So proveli is correct unless you explicitly mean a group of only women, in which case you would say provele.

Why is it u gradu and not u grad? What case is gradu?

Grad (“city”) is being used in the locative case here:

u gradu – in the city (location)
u grad – to the city (direction, movement toward)

The preposition u takes:

Accusative for movement into: Idem u grad. – I’m going to the city.
Locative for location: Sam u gradu. – I am in the city.

In Vikend smo proveli u gradu, you’re describing where you spent the weekend (location, not movement), so locative singular is used: gradu.

Could you replace u gradu with u gradu smo proveli vikend or u gradu smo proveli vikend? How flexible is the word order here?

Word order is quite flexible. All of these are grammatical (with slightly different emphasis):

Vikend smo proveli u gradu. – Focus on the weekend.
Proveli smo vikend u gradu. – Neutral, very common.
U gradu smo proveli vikend. – Focus on the place: In the city we spent the weekend (as opposed to somewhere else).
Vikend u gradu smo proveli. – Possible, but feels more stylistic / emphatic, less neutral.

The choice depends on what you want to highlight: time, place, or action. The core meaning (we + spent + weekend + in the city) doesn’t change.

Why isn’t the subject pronoun mi (“we”) used? Could you say Mi smo vikend proveli u gradu?

You normally omit subject pronouns in Croatian because the verb form already tells you the person and number:

smo proveli → 1st person plural → “we spent”

So Vikend smo proveli u gradu is completely natural and standard.

You can say Mi smo vikend proveli u gradu, but:

It adds emphasis to mi – we (not someone else) spent the weekend in the city.
It’s often used in contrast:
Mi smo vikend proveli u gradu, a oni su ga proveli na selu.
“We spent the weekend in the city, and they spent it in the countryside.”

Without contrast or emphasis, the pronoun is usually dropped.

What’s the difference between provesti and provoditi? Would Vikend smo provodili u gradu be correct?

Provesti and provoditi are aspectual pairs (perfective vs imperfective):

provesti (perfective) – to spend time as a completed, whole event
- Vikend smo proveli u gradu. – We spent the weekend in the city (viewed as a finished, one-time event).
provoditi (imperfective) – to be spending time, to habitually spend time
- Vikende smo provodili u gradu. – We used to spend weekends in the city / We were spending weekends in the city.
- Vikend smo provodili u gradu – We were spending the weekend in the city (descriptive, ongoing, less about completed fact).

Your sentence talks about a single, finished weekend, so proveli (from provesti) is the natural choice.

Why doesn’t Croatian use an article like “the” before vikend or grad?

Croatian has no articles (no direct equivalents of English “a/an/the”).
Definiteness and specificity are expressed through:

Context: we understand which weekend or city from the situation.
Word order and stress.
Pronouns or demonstratives if needed:
- Taj vikend smo proveli u gradu. – That weekend we spent in the city.

So Vikend smo proveli u gradu can correspond to English:

We spent the weekend in the city.
We spent a weekend in the city.

Context usually makes the intended reading clear.

If I want to say “We spent the weekend in the town” (a small town rather than a big city), do I still use grad?

In everyday Croatian, grad usually just means “town/city” (any urban settlement). There is no strict formal distinction like English “city” vs “town.”

So Vikend smo proveli u gradu can mean:

We spent the weekend in the city.
We spent the weekend in town.

If you want to emphasize smallness or contrast with a village or with a big city, you might specify:

u malom gradu – in a small town
u velikom gradu – in a big city

But just u gradu is the standard way to say “in town / in the city.”