Breakdown of Моя семья живёт в маленькой деревне.
маленький
small
мой
my (мой, моя, моё) / mine
семья
family
жить
to live
в
in / to (direction)
деревня
village
Questions & Answers about Моя семья живёт в маленькой деревне.
Why is the adjective маленькой ending in -ой instead of -ая?
It is in the Prepositional case because it describes the location (in a small village). The dictionary form is маленькая. For feminine adjectives describing a noun in the Prepositional case, the ending changes to -ой (or sometimes -ей).
Why does the word for village change to деревне here?
The dictionary form is деревня. Because we are talking about a location using the preposition в (in), the noun must be in the Prepositional case. Feminine nouns ending in -я change their ending to -е in this case.
A family has many people, so why does the verb живёт act like a singular word?
Even though a family is a group of people, the word семья (family) itself is a singular feminine noun. In Russian, just like in English, group nouns like this usually take the singular 'he/she/it' form of the verb.
The dictionary form for 'to live' is жить. Where does the в in живёт come from?
The verb жить is slightly irregular. When conjugated in the present tense, a в is added to the stem, and the endings use ё instead of е when stressed. So the form for a singular noun like семья becomes живёт.
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