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Questions & Answers about Dywan pasuje do kanapy.
Why is kanapy in the genitive case?
The preposition do always requires the genitive. Here do kanapy (“to/for the sofa”) uses the genitive singular of kanapa, which is kanapy.
What is the role of dywan in this sentence?
Dywan (“rug”) is the subject and therefore appears in the nominative case. The verb pasuje agrees with it in third-person singular masculine form.
Why is the verb pasuje used instead of something like odpowiada?
In Polish pasować means “to fit,” “to match,” or “to suit” (aesthetically or by size). Odpowiadać generally means “to correspond” or “to reply,” so it wouldn’t convey the idea of “matching” furniture.
Can the word order be changed in Dywan pasuje do kanapy?
Yes. Polish has fairly flexible word order. For emphasis you could say Do kanapy pasuje dywan or Pasuje dywan do kanapy, but the neutral Subject-Verb-Object order is Dywan pasuje do kanapy.
Does pasować ever take a different case or preposition?
Yes. When something “suits” a person or a time slot, pasować takes the dative without do. For example: Ten termin mi pasuje (“This date works for me”)—here mi is dative of ja.
How do you form the past or future of this sentence?
Past (masculine singular): Dywan pasował do kanapy.
Imperfective future: Dywan będzie pasował do kanapy.
(Using perfective dopasować would change the nuance to “adjust,” e.g. Dywan dopasuje się do kanapy.)
How would you say it if there were multiple rugs and multiple sofas?
You change dywan to nominative plural dywany, verb to third-person plural pasują, and kanapy to genitive plural kanap. The sentence becomes:
Dywany pasują do kanap.