Breakdown of Nie wiem, czy mogli to zbudować w tysiąc dziewięćset czterdziestym czwartym roku.
to
this
czy
[question particle]
nie
no / not
wiedzieć
to know
w
in / on (a day)
móc
to be able to
rok
year
czwarty
fourth
tysiąc
thousand
dziewięćset
nine hundred
zbudować
to build
czterdziesty
fortieth
Questions & Answers about Nie wiem, czy mogli to zbudować w tysiąc dziewięćset czterdziestym czwartym roku.
Why are only the last two parts of the year, czterdziestym czwartym, changed into the Locative case?
When saying a year in Polish, only the tens and units (the last parts) are treated as ordinal numbers (like '44th') and change their endings. The thousands and hundreds (tysiąc dziewięćset) stay as normal cardinal numbers and don't change. Because we use w (in) for years, the changing numbers and the word roku take the Locative case.
The English translation says 'if', so why is the word czy used instead of jeśli?
Czy is used for yes/no questions and indirect questions, meaning 'whether'. You use jeśli for conditions, like 'If it rains, we will stay home.' Since this sentence is an indirect question ('I do not know whether they were able...'), czy is the correct choice here.
Why is the verb form mogli used instead of mogły?
Mogli is the past tense of móc (to be able to) for the masculine personal 'they'. This implies the group of builders included at least one man. If the group was entirely made of women, or if the speaker was referring to machines, you would use the non-masculine form mogły.
Why do we use the perfective verb zbudować instead of the imperfective budować?
The speaker is talking about successfully completing the structure in that specific year, not just the ongoing, unfinished process of working on it. Perfective verbs like zbudować are used to focus on a finished result.
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