Петро взяв дитину за руку.

Петро is the subject, so it stays in the nominative case, which is the dictionary form.

Even though it ends in -о, Петро is a masculine proper name. In this sentence, it means Petro is the person doing the action, so no change is needed.

Взяв is the past tense form of взяти (to take). Its form tells us that the subject is:

• masculine
• singular
• in the past

So Петро взяв means Petro took.

If the subject were feminine, you would get взяла.
If plural, взяли.

Because дитину is in the accusative case. It is the direct object of the verb — the person being taken.

The base form is дитина (child), but after a transitive verb like взяв, Ukrainian uses the accusative:

• дитина = nominative
• дитину = accusative

So:

• Дитина прийшла. = The child came.
• Петро взяв дитину. = Petro took the child.

Yes. Дитина is a grammatically feminine noun, even though it can refer to a child of any sex.

That is why its accusative singular is дитину, following a common feminine pattern.

So grammatical gender and real-life gender are not always the same thing.

Here руку is also in the accusative case.

The preposition за can take different cases depending on meaning, but in this expression взяти за руку it uses the accusative and means to take someone by the hand.

So:

• рука = hand
• за руку = by the hand

This is a very common fixed pattern in Ukrainian.

Because after за the case depends on the meaning.

In this sentence, за means something like by / grabbing at / taking by, and that use takes the accusative:

• за руку

Forms like рукою are instrumental, but that is not the pattern used here.

So the natural expression is:

• взяти когось за руку = to take someone by the hand

Ukrainian often uses a body-part noun without an explicit possessive when it is obvious whose body part is meant.

So Петро взяв дитину за руку naturally means:

• Petro took the child by the hand

It does not usually need something like її руку or його руку unless you want to emphasize whose hand it was.

Also, singular is normal here because the idiom is за руку = by the hand.

This is about aspect.

• взяти / взяв = perfective
• брати / брав = imperfective

In this sentence, взяв presents the action as a completed whole: he took the child by the hand.

Брав would sound more like:

• he was taking
• he used to take
• he kept taking

So взяв is the natural choice for a single completed action.

Yes. Взяти когось за руку is a very common expression meaning:

• to take someone by the hand
• sometimes also to lead someone by the hand

It is a normal, everyday Ukrainian structure.

Yes. Ukrainian word order is more flexible than English word order because case endings show each word’s role.

The neutral order here is:

• Петро взяв дитину за руку.

But other orders are possible for emphasis, for example:

• Дитину Петро взяв за руку.
• Петро за руку взяв дитину.

These do not fundamentally change the meaning, but they can shift focus or emphasis.

Very close, yes. In context, it usually means that Petro grasped the child’s hand or led the child by the hand.

English and Ukrainian use very similar wording here, so this sentence is one of the easier patterns to understand directly.

You would change the past tense verb to the feminine form:

• Марія взяла дитину за руку.

The only change is:

• взяв → взяла

That is because Ukrainian past tense agrees with the subject in gender and number.

Ukrainian has no articles.

So дитину can mean:

• a child
• the child

Which one is meant depends on the context.

The same is true for руку:

• a hand
• the hand

In this sentence, English usually chooses the child and the hand or just says by the hand, depending on the translation style.