Breakdown of Oni wzięli wszystko ze stołu.
stół
table
oni
they (masculine personal)
wziąć
to take (perf.)
wszystko
everything
z
from (+ Genitive)
Questions & Answers about Oni wzięli wszystko ze stołu.
Why do we use ze here instead of just z?
We use ze instead of z to make pronunciation easier. When a word starts with certain consonant clusters, especially those starting with s, z, sz, or rz followed by another consonant, Polish adds an e. Since stołu starts with st, saying z stołu would be hard to pronounce, so it becomes ze stołu.
What case is stołu and why?
Stołu is in the genitive case. The preposition z (or ze), when it means "from" or "off of", always requires the following noun to be in the genitive case. The dictionary form is stół.
I learned that "to take" is brać. Why does this sentence use wzięli?
Brać is the imperfective verb, focusing on the process of taking. This sentence focuses on the completed action, so it uses the perfective equivalent wziąć. They are a pair but look completely different because they come from different historical roots. Wzięli is the past tense masculine personal form of wziąć.
Could we say One wzięły instead of Oni wzięli?
Yes, but it changes who did the taking. Oni wzięli means "they took" where the group includes at least one man (the masculine personal form). If the group was entirely female, children, or objects, you would use the non-masculine personal form One wzięły.
Learn Oni wzięli wszystko ze stołu and more in Polish
All course content and exercises are completely free — no paywalls, no trial periods, no signup needed.
- ✓ Practice with interactive exercises
- ✓ Track your progress with spaced repetition
- ✓Learn at your own pace — completely free