29 Plural of Masculine Nouns and Adjectives

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If the world were a simple place, Croatian masculine nouns would have their nominative plural made just by adding an -i, and accusative plural just by an -e. Well, it’s almost so, but there are few twists.

Most masculine nouns do simply get an -i in nominative plural:

krevet bed → kreveti beds
prozor window → prozori windows
tanjur (») plate (to eat from) → tanjuri plates ®

What about the accusative case? It has just an -e instead of -i:

Goran pereprati zube. Goran is ‘washing’ his teeth.

(Yes, in Croatian, teeth are ‘washed’ and not ‘brushed’.)

And now, a few complications.

A few masculine nouns shift their stress in plural. One such noun is quite common:

mjesec moon/month → mjeseci

A couple of nouns that get simply an -i in nom. plural undergo a consonant change if they end in either k, g or h. It does not happen in the accusative plural, only when an -i is added (that is, in the N-pl):

N	N-pl	A-pl
putnik traveler	putnici	putnike
razlog reason	razlozi	razloge
uspjeh success	uspjesi	uspjehe
prozor window	prozori	prozore

However, most one-syllable nouns (that is, nouns that have only one vowel) get a longer ending; most of them -ovi:

brod ship → brodovi grad city → gradovi lijek cure → lijekovi

sin son → sinovi vrt garden → vrtovi ® zid wall → zidovi

(I hope you remember that e.g. lijek is just a spelling convention, the word is actually pronounced as ljek, and therefore has only one syllable, so it gets longer endings for plural.)

The consonant alternations described above (e.g. k → c) do not happen if the noun gets longer endings in plural:

vlak train → vlakovi ®

If such short nouns end in a Croatian-specific letter, they get -evi instead:

broj number → brojevi ključ key → ključevi

miš mouse → miševi nož knife → noževi

(It’s the same principle as for -om vs. -em for change of adjectives in masc. and neuter genders.)

If one-syllable nouns end in a -c (it’s a Croatian-specific letter!) it turns into a č before -evi:

princ prince → prinčevi
zec rabbit, bunny → zečevi

A few one-syllable nouns do not end in a Croatian-specific letter, but get -evi nevertheless:

car emperor → carevi

sir cheese → sirevi

A couple of nouns often have -evi in everyday, colloquial communication, but according to the rules of Standard Croatian, -ovi is preferred (I personally use -evi)®:

kut angle, corner ® nos nose

pojas belt put way

(The noun pojas belt, despite having two syllables, gets longer endings; more nouns like that are listed below.)

Furthermore, there are a few exceptions: certain common one-syllable nouns get simply an -i; they are listed here:

crv worm đak pupil dan day

gost guest gumb button ® keks biscuit

konj horse mrav ant pas (ps-) dog

I haven’t listed prst finger/toe and zub tooth since we have already learned them. The noun đak gets the same alternation as putnik, so its N-pl is đaci. There are more nouns like that, some will be introduced later.

There’s a quite odd noun that has different plural forms depending on its meaning:

sat hour → sati hours
sat clock, watch → satovi clocks, watches

The noun bol pain is usually feminine ®, but in plural, the masculine bolovi is quite frequent, while regular boli is usually used for non-physical pains, and in poetry:

bol f pain → pl.	bolovi m (physical)
	boli f (emotional, poetic)

There are nouns that have two syllables in nominative, but a one-syllable case-base. Most such nouns get short endings, like any other two-syllable nouns:

glumac (glumc-) actor → glumci
lonac (lonc-) pot → lonci
nokat (nokt-) fingernail/toenail → nokti

However, a few such nouns get longer endings, as one-syllable nouns do; the only option is to remember them (the list below is not exhaustive):

bubanj (bubnj-) drum → bubnjevi
češalj (češlj-) comb → češljevi
dio (dijel-) part ® → dijelovi
lakat (lakt-) elbow → laktovi
otac (oc-) father → očevi
vjetar (vjetr-) wind → vjetrovi

There are several two-syllable nouns that usually get longer endings. Notably, they include bird species:

galeb gull

golub pidgeon

labud swan

(The Core Dictionary lists all unusual plural forms of nouns included in it.)

The accusative case for longer plural again has just -e instead of the final -i:

Gledam brodove. I’m watching ships.

One masculine noun has a completely irregular plural, and one more has no real plural but something else that will be explained a bit later:

čovjek man/human → ljudi people, men and women
brat brother → ?

The noun ljudi has a slightly different meaning than čovjek, it’s more generic, and can be often translated as people. It also corresponds to the English phrase men, women and children used to describe a mixed group. In a more narrow sense, it corresponds to men and women (i.e. all adults). You would use two words only when you compare sexes:

ljudi people = men and women
muškarci i žene men and women (focus on sex differences!) ®

Warning: if you attempt to translate men and women as ljudi i žene, it could sound like an insult – you would basically say that women are non-human. However, this is used in some rural areas of Croatia, where the word muškarac is rare. ®

Unfortunately, there’s more: some nouns in N-pl have a bit unexpected – and unsettled – spelling. They have case-base in -tk-; for example:

redak (retk-) line of text
početak (početk-) beginning

From everything you have learned so far, you would expect the forms:

N	DL	N-pl	A-pl
redak	retku	retci	retke
početak	početku	početci	početke

However, since the sequence tc in N-pl is normally pronounced just as c, it was traditionally spelled without the t. On the contrary, more recent Croatian orthography manuals mandate writing tc – and here’s a crazy thing – dc if the N has a d! So, be prepared to see all possible variants®:

N	DL	N-pl	A-pl
redak	retku	reci retci redci	retke
početak	početku	počeci početci	početke

The most recent Croatian orthography manual allows also c-only forms for some frequent nouns, such as:

gubitak (gubitk-) loss ostatak (ostatk-) remainder početak (početk-) beginning

predak (pretk-) ancestor trenutak (trenutk-) moment zadatak (zadatk-) task

But the noun redak (retk-) is not one of them! I expect there will be more changes in the future regarding this group of nouns. (Google™ for forms preci, pretci and predci on the .hr domain, to check frequencies. Don’t forget that the most regular form – pretci – is non-standard, according to the latest manual.)

What about adjectives? They are much simpler – they just get the following endings (equal to short endings for nouns) without any complications:

adjectives	N-pl	A-pl
masculine	-i	-e

While the ending -i is a bit optional for adjectives in N singular of the masculine genders, it has nothing with -i in plural: that ending is mandatory. Futhermore, all adjectives get the same plural endings, including moj my, taj (t-) that etc. The only ‘weird’ form of adjectives is the masc. singular N.

For example:

Gledam velike brodove. I’m watching big ships.

Goran ima prljave laktove. Goran has dirty elbows.

This applies to past forms of verbs as well:

Psi su bili gladni. Dogs were hungry.

________

® Instead of tanjur (») plate, a slightly different word tanjir (») is used in Serbia and most of Bosnia. In the coastal areas of Croatia, you’ll often hear pjat or pijat for plate.

Instead of vrt garden, the word bašta is much more common in Serbia for garden, and it’s used alongside vrt in Bosnia.

Instead of vlak train, the word voz is used in Serbia and most of Bosnia. Instead of kut, the word ugao (ugl-) is used for angle, corner in Serbia. That word is used in Bosnia too, but you can find also kut in Bosnia.

Instead of gumb, the word dugme (dugmet-) is used for button in Bosnia and Serbia. In the coastal areas of Croatia, the word botun (») is common for button.

The form nosevi is accepted as standard in Serbia, besides nosovi.

The masculine singular form bol m pain is much more frequent in Serbia.

In Serbia, the word dio (dijel-) m part has an unexpected “Ekavian” form deo (del-) m; the plural is the expected delovi.

In Bosnia, Montenegro, and in central parts of Serbia, the word muškarac is rare, so the construction ljudi i žene sounds normal in these regions.

Serbian standard orthography allows only spellings like reci, preci, etc.

↓ Something Possibly Interesting (click to show)

If you’re puzzled why almost all one-syllable nouns get -ov- in plural, the likely answer is this: 1400 years ago, there was a small, but frequently used group of masculine nouns, called u-nouns. Nouns sin son and dom home were among them (they had a bit different shape back then). They had special case endings, some of them containing -ov-.

From these nouns, the inserted -ov- in plural has spread to almost all one-syllable masculine nouns.

Athough almost all recenty introduced nouns follow the rules for plural, at least one doesn’t: the plural of gen gene is geni, not genovi!

Croatian standard language manuals universally condemn forms like noseve (A-pl of nos), despite that form being 7 times more common (on the Internet) than nosove, since they break the rule when the e-endings are used. In speech, forms nosevi and noseve prevail almost completely. This is a textbook example of language prescriptivism, i.e. forcing a rule that’s not respected in the language as it’s really used.

Spelling of nouns such as predak, sudac and so on is a matter of endless debate and small differences in various spelling manuals published by various institutions in Croatia.

Do you still think Croatian spelling is phonetic, obvious and simple?

↓ Exercise (click to show)

Complete the following sentences:

Show a pop-up Croatian keyboard

žedni. People are thirsty.

Goran gleda . Goran is watching swans.

Ana reže . Ana is cutting (i.e. trimming) her nails.

Čekamo . We’re waiting for the guests.

Tražimo . We’re looking for the keys.

trče. Dogs are running.

su u vlaku. The travelers are in the train.

su u ladici. Knives are in the drawer.

To su bili . These were my beginnings.

su rijetki. Successes are rare.

Vidim . I see ants.

To . These are the guests.

su skupi. Watches are expensive.

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