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Questions & Answers about У меня много друзей.
What does У меня literally mean in English?
Literally, У меня means "at me," but in context it’s used to indicate possession. So, У меня много друзей is understood as "I have many friends."
Why is there no explicit verb like "have" in the sentence?
Russian often expresses possession without a dedicated verb. Instead of saying "I have," it uses a structure based on location—У меня ("at me")—combined with a quantity (in this case, много meaning "many") to convey that idea.
What case is used for друзей and why is that form required?
Друзей is in the genitive plural form. In Russian, quantifiers such as много require the noun that follows to be in the genitive case to indicate quantity, hence друзей rather than the nominative plural друзья.
Why can’t we use the nominative plural form, друзья, after много?
After quantifiers like много, Russian grammar demands the noun be in the genitive case. This rule applies because the genitive form expresses an indefinite or unspecified quantity, which fits the meaning conveyed by много ("many" or "a lot").
Can the structure У меня with a quantifier be used in other contexts?
Yes, this possessive structure is common in Russian. You can use У меня with various quantifiers (like несколько for "several" or мало for "few") to indicate possession. For instance, У меня несколько книг means "I have several books," and the noun книг is in the genitive plural, following the same grammatical rule.