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Questions & Answers about Zostawił duży spadek.
The word spadek means "inheritance" here, but doesn't it also mean "decrease" or "drop"?
Yes! Spadek is a very versatile noun. Depending on the context, it can mean a financial inheritance, a decline or decrease (like spadek cen - a drop in prices), or even a physical slope.
Why do duży spadek look like they are in the Nominative (subject) case if they are the direct object?
They are actually in the Accusative case because they are the direct object of the verb zostawił. Because spadek is a masculine inanimate noun, its Accusative form is identical to its Nominative form. The adjective duży follows the same rule to match the noun.
Since this lesson is about the preposition po, how would I use it here to say "an inheritance from him"?
In Polish, to say you inherited something "from" someone, you use po followed by the Locative case. So "an inheritance from him" would be spadek po nim. If it were an inheritance from a grandfather, it would be spadek po dziadku.
What is the imperfective equivalent of the verb zostawił?
The perfective verb used here is zostawić, which focuses on the completed action of having left something behind. The imperfective equivalent is zostawiać. If you wanted to describe the ongoing action of "he was leaving" something, you would use zostawiał.