Breakdown of Моему брату двадцать пять лет, а сестре девятнадцать лет.
Questions & Answers about Моему брату двадцать пять лет, а сестре девятнадцать лет.
Russian normally drops the present‑tense form of быть (“to be”) in simple “X is Y” sentences.
So instead of a literal “My brother is 25 years old”, Russian just says:
- Моему брату двадцать пять лет.
Literally: “To my brother twenty‑five years.”
The verb есть (the present of “to be”) exists, but in sentences like this it’s usually omitted. You would not say:
- ✗ Моему брату есть двадцать пять лет.
That sounds unnatural in standard modern Russian. The zero‑copula (no verb) is the normal way to say someone’s age in the present tense.
They are in the dative case, because Russian expresses age with a “to someone there are X years” structure:
- Кому? (to whom?) – dative case
- Сколько лет? (how many years?)
So:
- Моему брату = to my brother (dative of мой брат)
- сестре = to (my) sister (dative of сестра)
Compare:
- Nominative: мой брат – my brother
Dative: моему брату – to my brother
- Nominative: моя сестра – my sister
- Dative: моей сестре → here shortened to just сестре – to (my) sister
The pattern for age is:
- Мне двадцать лет. – I am 20.
- Тебе тридцать лет. – You are 30.
- Ему сорок лет. – He is 40.
- Ей восемнадцать лет. – She is 18.
Always dative for the person: мне, тебе, ему, ей, брату, сестре etc.
Моему is a declined form of the possessive pronoun мой (“my”).
Russian pronouns agree with the noun in gender, number, and case:
For мой брат (my brother – masculine singular):
- Nominative: мой брат – my brother
- Genitive: моего брата – of my brother
- Dative: моему брату – to my brother
- Accusative: моего брата
- Instrumental: моим братом
- Prepositional: о моём брате
In your sentence, the noun брату is dative singular masculine, so the pronoun must also be dative singular masculine:
- моему брату – to my brother
Лет is a form of the word год (“year”). Specifically, лет is the genitive plural form, and it’s what you use with many numbers when talking about age.
Russian has three main forms of “year” in this context:
- год
- года
- лет
The choice depends on the number:
- 1 year: 1 год – один год
- 2–4 years: 2, 3, 4 года – два / три / четыре года
- 5–20 years: лет – пять лет, шестнадцать лет
- 21 year: 21 год – двадцать один год
- 22–24 years: года – двадцать два года
- 25–30 years: лет – двадцать пять лет, тридцать лет
In your sentence:
- двадцать пять лет – 25 years
(ends in 5 → use лет) - девятнадцать лет – 19 years
(between 5 and 20 → use лет)
So лет basically means “years” in this construction.
You can omit лет in the second part. Both versions are correct:
- Моему брату двадцать пять лет, а сестре девятнадцать лет.
- Моему брату двадцать пять лет, а сестре девятнадцать.
Leaving it out in the second clause is very natural and common in speech, because it’s understood from context. You can even drop лет in both parts in very informal speech:
- Брату двадцать пять, а сестре девятнадцать.
But in careful or written style, including лет at least once (as in your original sentence) is preferred.
Both а and и can be translated as “and”, but they are not the same:
- и = and, simply adding information (X and Y together)
- а = and/but, often contrasting or comparing (X, while Y)
In your sentence:
- Моему брату двадцать пять лет, а сестре девятнадцать лет.
А suggests a kind of contrast or comparison between the brother’s and sister’s ages: my brother is 25, whereas my sister is 19.
You could say:
- Моему брату двадцать пять лет, и сестре девятнадцать лет.
That’s grammatically fine, but sounds more like you’re just listing facts, with less sense of contrast. А is more natural here when you’re directly comparing two people.
Russian doesn’t have articles (“a/the”), and it also doesn’t like repeating possessive pronouns when it’s obvious who you’re talking about.
After you say моему брату (“to my brother”), listeners automatically assume that сестре refers to your sister (or at least the sibling in the same context), unless there’s a reason to think otherwise.
So:
- Моему брату двадцать пять лет, а сестре девятнадцать лет.
is naturally understood as:
- “My brother is 25, and my sister is 19.”
You can say:
- Моему брату двадцать пять лет, а моей сестре девятнадцать лет.
That’s also correct, but often sounds a bit heavier or more formal; in everyday speech, the second моей is usually left out when it’s clear from context.
Russian numerals do decline, but in this sentence they appear in their nominative form.
The structure “кому сколько лет” (“to whom how many years”) works like this:
- The person: dative (моему брату, сестре)
- The age phrase: nominative numeral + noun in genitive plural
So:
- двадцать пять лет – numeral in nominative (двадцать пять) + noun in genitive plural (лет)
- девятнадцать лет – same idea
In other cases or contexts, these numerals do change:
- о двадцати пяти годах – about twenty‑five years
- к девятнадцати годам – by the age of nineteen
But in the age sentence pattern “Кому сколько лет?”, the form you use is the nominative numeral + лет.
Yes, Russian word order is rather flexible, and your variant is grammatically correct:
- Двадцать пять лет моему брату, а сестре девятнадцать лет.
The differences are in emphasis:
- Моему брату двадцать пять лет… – neutral, focuses first on who (my brother), then gives his age.
- Двадцать пять лет моему брату… – puts more emphasis on the age itself: “Twenty‑five years is (what) my brother (has).”
In everyday speech, the original order (Моему брату двадцать пять лет…) is more typical and sounds most neutral.
You use the same dative + сколько лет structure:
- Сколько лет твоему брату и сестре?
– How old are your brother and sister?
Or, a bit more explicit:
- Сколько лет твоему брату и сколько лет твоей сестре?
Some possible answers following the same pattern:
- Моему брату двадцать пять лет, а сестре девятнадцать лет.
- Брату двадцать пять, сестре девятнадцать. (more informal)