Czy możesz odpowiedzieć na to pytanie?

you

Breakdown of Czy możesz odpowiedzieć na to pytanie?

• to: this
• na: to
• czy: question marker

Questions & Answers about Czy możesz odpowiedzieć na to pytanie?

What does czy do at the beginning of the sentence?

Czy is a particle used to introduce a yes/no question.

So:

• Czy możesz odpowiedzieć na to pytanie? = Can you answer this question?

It does not have a direct English equivalent in this sentence. It mainly signals that the speaker is asking a question.

You can sometimes leave czy out in speech if your intonation already makes it clear that it is a question:

• Możesz odpowiedzieć na to pytanie?

That is still natural, but czy makes the question more explicitly marked.

Why are there two verbs: możesz odpowiedzieć?

This is because Polish often forms can + verb the same way English does:

• możesz = you can / you are able
• odpowiedzieć = to answer

So literally, the structure is:

• Czy możesz odpowiedzieć... = Can you answer...

Here:

• możesz is the conjugated verb
• odpowiedzieć stays in the infinitive

This is very common with modal-like verbs in Polish.

What form is możesz?