Imam tri poena.

to have

Breakdown of Imam tri poena.

• tri: three
• poen: a point in a game

Questions & Answers about Imam tri poena.

What does imam mean, and what verb does it come from?

Imam means I have. It comes from the verb imati, which means to have.

It is the 1st person singular present tense form:

• imam = I have
• imaš = you have
• ima = he/she/it has

So Imam tri poena literally starts with I have.

Why isn’t ja included?

Because Serbian usually does not need the subject pronoun when the verb ending already shows who the subject is.

In imam, the ending -am already tells you it means I have, so ja is normally omitted.

• Imam tri poena. = neutral, natural
• Ja imam tri poena. = I have three points, with extra emphasis

Why is it tri poena and not tri poeni?

After the numbers dva, tri, četiri (2, 3, 4), Serbian nouns often take a special counting form instead of the regular plural.

So:

• jedan poen = one point
• tri poena = three points
• not tri poeni

The form poeni is the regular plural, but it is the form normally used after .