Breakdown of У скульптора не было ни глины, ни молотка, с которыми он работает.
не
not
он
he / it (for a masculine noun) / it (for a neuter noun)
работать
to work
у
at, by
быть
to be
с
with (also со)
который
which / who / that (relative pronoun)
ни
neither / nor
скульптор
the sculptor
глина
the clay
молоток
the hammer
Questions & Answers about У скульптора не было ни глины, ни молотка, с которыми он работает.
Why is которыми plural here if the word right before it is just молотка (a hammer)?
Которыми is plural because it refers back to both items mentioned in the first half of the sentence: the clay (глина) and the hammer (молоток). Since it points to multiple things together, the relative pronoun must be plural.
Why do we use the Instrumental case (с которыми) in the second clause?
The case of который is always determined by its role in its own part of the sentence (the relative clause). Here, the verb is работать (to work). To say what you are working with, you use с + Instrumental. Since he works with these items, we use the Instrumental plural form которыми.
Normally, tools are used in the bare Instrumental case without a preposition (e.g., работать молотком). Why is there a с here?
You're right that tools usually take the bare Instrumental. However, работать с (to work with) is the standard way to talk about working with materials (like clay) or people/clients. Because которыми stands in for both a material and a tool, using с acts as a natural catch-all meaning "the things with which he works."
Why does the sentence use the neuter verb было instead of a plural verb for the clay and hammer?
In Russian, negative possession phrases using у [someone] не было (someone did not have) are impersonal. There is no grammatical subject. Because it is impersonal, the past tense verb defaults to the neuter singular (было), regardless of how many things are missing.
Why are глины and молотка in the Genitive case, and what happened to the spelling of молотка?
They are Genitive because they are the missing items in the negative possession phrase не было. The dictionary form for the hammer is молоток. When adding the Genitive ending -а, the final о drops out because it is a "fleeting vowel," resulting in молотка.
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