Because bez always takes the genitive case in standard Croatian.
The basic form is:
After bez, the noun must change to genitive singular:
So:
Because o in the sense of about / concerning normally takes the locative case.
So the noun changes from nominative singular:
to locative singular:
That is why we say:
The dictionary form is vrijeme.
That is the nominative singular form, the form you would usually find in a vocabulary list.
From that base form, you get:
Because vrijeme belongs to a special group of neuter nouns that have an expanded stem in oblique cases.
So instead of simply adding an ending to vrijeme, Croatian uses the stem vremen-:
This pattern is common with nouns like:
So vrijeme is not fully regular in the way a noun like selo is.
Not exactly. Those endings are very common, but the full pattern depends on the noun type.
For vrijeme, the forms are:
Many neuter nouns also have:
For example:
So the case endings are familiar, but vrijeme is still special because of the stem change vrijeme → vremen-.
They literally mean:
Notice that genitiv and lokativ themselves also change form here:
That is because they come after u, meaning in, and here u is used with the locative case.
So the grammar terms are being declined too.
No. U can take either the locative or the accusative, depending on meaning.
A simple rule is:
Examples:
In u genitivu and u lokativu, the idea is in the genitive / in the locative, so Croatian uses the locative.
In Croatian, kažemo is often used in explanations to mean something like:
It does not have to mean a literal group of people speaking together. It is a very natural way to present grammar or usage.
So:
Yes, exactly.
One of the most important things in Croatian is that prepositions usually require a specific case. In this sentence:
So when you learn a preposition, it is best to learn it together with the case it governs.
For example:
That way, forms like bez vremena and o vremenu become much easier to remember.