Breakdown of Właścicielka nie znała przyczyny, więc musiała zgadywać.
nie
no / not
znać
to know (someone or something)
musieć
to have to
więc
so, therefore
Questions & Answers about Właścicielka nie znała przyczyny, więc musiała zgadywać.
How can I tell if musiała zgadywać means she 'must have guessed' or she 'had to guess'?
In Polish, the past tense of musieć does double duty. It expresses both past obligation (she had to do it) and past deduction (she must have done it). You rely entirely on context. Here, the logical flow of 'she didn't know, so...' makes this a deduction about what likely happened, rather than a forced obligation.
Why use the imperfective zgadywać instead of the perfective zgadnąć?
The imperfective zgadywać focuses on the ongoing action or process of making guesses. The perfective zgadnąć implies successfully guessing the right answer. Because she didn't know the cause, she was engaged in the act of guessing, so the imperfective gives the sense of 'she must have been guessing'.
Why is the word for 'cause' in the genitive case (przyczyny) instead of the accusative (przyczynę)?
This is a classic refresher on the genitive of negation. The verb znać (to know) normally takes a direct object in the accusative case. However, whenever a verb that takes the accusative is negated with nie, its direct object automatically switches to the genitive case.
Does właścicielka specifically mean 'landlady', or can it refer to any female owner?