Breakdown of Наша прибыль была маленькая, потому что мы закрыли производство в две тысячи двенадцатом году.
мы
we
маленький
small
наш
our (наш, наша, наше)
потому что
because
год
year
две
two (f)
быть
to be
в
on / during (a time period)
закрыть
to close
тысяча
thousand
двенадцатый
twelfth
прибыль
the profit (f)
производство
the production (n)
Questions & Answers about Наша прибыль была маленькая, потому что мы закрыли производство в две тысячи двенадцатом году.
Why does the sentence use в ... году instead of the regular Prepositional ending в ... годе?
The word год (year) is one of a special group of masculine nouns that take an irregular -у ending in the Prepositional case when answering the questions 'where?' or 'when?'. When paired with the preposition в to mean 'in the year', it is always в году.
Why is only the word двенадцатом in the Prepositional case, while две тысячи is not?
In Russian, when you state a specific year, only the very last word of the number acts like an ordinal number (like 'twelfth') and changes to the Prepositional case. The earlier parts of the year stay as regular cardinal numbers in the Nominative case. That is why we say две тысячи (two thousand) followed by двенадцатом (twelfth).
The word прибыль ends in a soft sign. How can I tell its gender from this sentence?
Nouns ending in a soft sign can be either masculine or feminine, but the surrounding words give it away! The possessive pronoun наша (our), the past tense verb была (was), and the adjective маленькая (small) all have feminine endings, showing that прибыль (profit) is a feminine noun.
Why do we use the perfective verb закрыли here instead of the imperfective закрывали?
We use the perfective verb закрыли because closing the production was a single, fully completed event in the past with a definite result. If they had been in the ongoing process of closing it over a period of time without finishing, we would use the imperfective form.
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