Breakdown of Стадо коров, пасущееся у реки, принадлежит фермеру.
у
at, by
река
river
фермер
farmer
корова
cow
принадлежать
to belong
стадо
herd
пастись
to graze
Questions & Answers about Стадо коров, пасущееся у реки, принадлежит фермеру.
What который clause does пасущееся replace in this sentence?
It replaces которое пасётся (which is grazing). Because the head noun стадо (herd) is neuter and in the nominative case, the present active participle also takes the neuter nominative ending -ее before adding the reflexive particle.
Why does the reflexive participle пасущееся end in -ся after a vowel, instead of -сь?
This is a special spelling rule for participles. Unlike regular verbs where the reflexive particle shrinks to -сь after a vowel (like in the past tense оно паслось), participles always keep the full -ся ending, no matter what letter comes before it.
Why does the participle match стадо (neuter singular) instead of коров (plural), since the cows are the ones grazing?
Grammatically, the participle modifies the core subject of the sentence, which is стадо (herd). Even though logically the cows are doing the eating, Russian requires the participle to agree in gender, number, and case with the head noun of the phrase. If it modified коров, the sentence would be стадо коров, пасущихся у реки.
Why are there commas around пасущееся у реки?
In Russian, a participle phrase must be enclosed in commas when it comes immediately after the noun it describes (стадо). If we flipped the word order to put the participle phrase first, the commas would disappear: Пасущееся у реки стадо коров принадлежит фермеру.
Why is фермеру in the dative case?
The verb принадлежать (to belong to) always requires the dative case to indicate who the owner of the item is.
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