Questions & Answers about Stavi jastuk na krevet, molim te.
Why is the verb stavi used here, and what form is it?
Stavi is the singular imperative form of staviti, which means to put / to place.
So Stavi jastuk na krevet means Put the pillow on the bed when speaking to one person informally.
A useful comparison:
- stavi = put it / place it (command to one person)
- stavite = command to more than one person or to one person formally
Because this is a command, Croatian does not need to say the subject you explicitly.
Why is it stavi and not stavljaj?
This is about aspect, which is very important in Croatian.
- staviti is perfective
- stavljati is imperfective
The imperative stavi usually tells someone to do a single, completed action: Put the pillow on the bed.
The form stavljaj would sound more like:
- keep putting
- be putting
- put repeatedly / habitually
In this sentence, the speaker wants one finished result, so stavi is the natural choice.