Passive participles as adjectives

Passive participles as adjectives

Passive adjectival participles (like przebudowany — rebuilt, or zaprojektowany — designed) behave exactly like standard adjectives. They must agree in gender, number, and case with the noun they modify.

In the Nominative case, masculine adjectives take -y or -i, feminine adjectives take -a, and neuter adjectives take -e.

The rebuilt overpass is very high.
Przebudowany wiadukt jest bardzo wysoki.
This new district is a well-designed investment.
Ta nowa dzielnica to dobrze zaprojektowana inwestycja.

Describing states

Used with the verb być (to be), participles describe the state or condition of an object. They continue to act as adjectives and match the subject's gender and number.

The new fountain is surrounded by benches.
Nowa fontanna jest otoczona ławkami.
This closed zone is too dark.
Ta zamknięta strefa jest zbyt ciemna.

Declining for case

Like all adjectives, passive participles decline through the grammatical cases to match their nouns.

For example, the Locative case is often used after prepositions of location like po (around/on), na (on), or w (in). Masculine and neuter locative adjectives take -ym or -im, while feminine locative adjectives take -ej.

She is walking alone on the rebuilt promenade.
Ona spaceruje sama po przebudowanym deptaku.
He is sitting alone on a forgotten bench under the overpass.
On siedzi sam na zapomnianej ławce pod wiaduktem.

When expressing a lack of something, Polish uses the Genitive case. For plural adjectives in the Genitive, the ending is -ych or -ich.

There are no repaired benches here.
Nie ma tu naprawionych ławek.

Participle phrases

Because participles originate from verbs, they can still be modified by adverbs or prepositional phrases. An entire descriptive phrase can be placed before the noun it modifies.

The fountain built under the overpass is beautiful.
Zbudowana pod wiaduktem fontanna jest piękna.

Plural agreement

Passive participles also agree in number. When modifying plural nouns in the Nominative case, they take standard plural adjective endings (such as -e for non-virile nouns like districts or objects).

The rebuilt promenades are finally completed.
Przebudowane deptaki są wreszcie ukończone.