Czech Language

Czech is a redirect to this article. Further meanings are listed under Czech (disambiguation) .

Czech (čeština)
Spoken in	Czech Republic Slovakia United States Serbia Austria Croatia Romania
speaker	13.4 million
Linguistic classification	Indo-European languages Slavic languages West Slavic languages Czech
Official status
Official language in	Czech Republic European Union
Recognized minority / regional language in	Bosnia and Herzegovina Croatia Austria Poland Romania Slovakia
Language codes
ISO 639 -1	cs
ISO 639 -2	( B ) cze	( T ) ces
ISO 639-3	ces

The Czech language (outdated Bohemian language ; Czech: český jazyk or čeština ) belongs to the West Slavic branch of the Indo-European language family .

Czech is spoken as their mother tongue by around 10.6 million people (as of 2016), of which around 10.4 million live in the Czech Republic , where it is the official language . Since May 1, 2004 , Czech has also been an official language of the EU . The science that deals with the Czech language is bohemistics .

history

The first Slavic written language in today's Czech language area was the Old Church Slavonic, which was written in Glagolitic , which was introduced in Greater Moravia in 863 by the brothers Cyril and Methodius .

Jan Hus

The first evidence of the old Czech language (Bohemian, Bohemian) are religious songs and short texts, so-called glosses, from the 12th and 13th centuries. There is poetic court literature from the 14th and 15th centuries. In the 14th century, all parts of the Bible were also translated into Czech, but not as a coherent work. Around 1400 Jan Hus introduced a written language based on the Prague dialect of his time and the two diacritical marks háček and čárka to reproduce the Czech sounds more precisely . He also revised translations of all parts of the Bible. Book printing was not yet available during his lifetime. The New Testament was first printed in Czech in 1475, and the entire Bible for the first time in 1488. The classic Czech translation of the Bible, the so-called Kralitz Bible , was not published in six parts until 1579-1594.

From the late 15th to the early 17th century, Czech was used as a document language in Upper Silesia and even temporarily pushed back German. It had the advantage of being understood by the Slavic-speaking part of the local population and of having been developed by the Prague office - at the same time as German - into a suitable administrative language.

Josef Dobrovský and Josef Jungmann, two of the founders of the modern written Czech language

After the Battle of White Mountain in 1620, the Counter-Reformation and Habsburg rule gradually pushed the use of written Czech and spoken Czech back in favor of the German in the countries of the Bohemian Crown (in the 19th century this period was called the time of the “decline” of the Czech Language). In the era of the "National Revival" between 1780 and 1848, the written Czech language of the 17th and 18th centuries was therefore heavily criticized, as was the modern Czech written language, which was mainly used by Josef Dobrovský , Josef Jungmann and the Slovaks Jan Kollár and Pavel Jozef Šafárik was created, leaned heavily on the language of the 16th century (the "Golden Age").

In 1860 the first public performance (První česká beseda) of a Czech choir in the Czech language took place in Lužánky (Brno Augarten) . It was led by the priest František Fiala. The event was approved on the condition that a German song was also sung. The Brno Music Association "Beseda Brněnská", which still exists today, was established on this occasion.

It was not until 1880 that Czech was given the status of an official language again in Bohemia and Moravia in the wake of the national rebirth of the Czechs, without achieving full equality with German in both crown lands until the end of the Danube Monarchy.

Varieties

The regulated written language, in accordance with the written form, is spoken on official occasions (e.g. news on radio, TV, celebratory speeches), but the dialects actually spoken often differ greatly, both in pronunciation and in grammar.

Dialects

Czech dialects with subgroups

Languages ​​and dialects in East Central and Eastern Europe

The following geographical dialect groups are distinguished:

1. Czech (Bohemian) dialect group (a - Northeast subgroup b - Middle / Central c - Southwest d - Bohemian-Moravian)
2. Central (Central) Moravian Group
3. East Moravian Group
4. Silesian group (a - Silesian-Moravian b - Silesian-Polish)
5. Border areas with inconsistent dialect affiliation (mixed with the arrival of a large number of Czechs and Slovaks of different origins from 1945 onwards. German-speaking majority of the population before 1945).

The original dialects have disappeared in most of the language area in favor of a common colloquial language with only regional accents. This process began in the 17th century and has intensified significantly in the 20th century due to the influence of the media.

Colloquial language

Today's colloquial language is called Common Bohemian (obecná čeština) and stands out clearly from the written language (spisovná čeština) . It is not a specific local dialect, but the spoken language, which is particularly common in Bohemia. Some (especially Moravian) linguists refer to the colloquial language as interdialect , which is a common dialect that stands above other dialects.

The dialects of Czech spoken in Moravia are summarized under the collective term Moravian language . Noteworthy here is u. a. the "Brno colloquial language" ( Hantec ), a relic of the Brno red word .

A particularly old form of Czech is spoken by the Czech minority in the Banat .

distribution

Number of speakers

Czechs in the USA

Most of the Czech speakers outside the Czech Republic live in the United States, with 47,500 speakers. The largest Czech-speaking community is in Texas . In Slovakia, 35,000 people give Czech as their mother tongue. Most of the 17,700 speakers in Austria are Viennese Czechs . The Czech minority in the Banat is divided between Romania and Serbia. A small minority also lives in the Polish border area.

Slovakia

→ Main article : Differences between the Czech and Slovak languages

Czech and Slovak are relatively easy to understand. Due to the similarity of the two languages, the common history since the codification of the two languages ​​and the connection in Czechoslovakia , Slovaks and Czechs understand each other, but the younger generation, who were linguistically socialized after the division of the common state, find it a little more difficult. Regardless of this, official documents in the respective language are still automatically recognized in the Czech Republic and Slovakia. The right to use the other language in official dealings is even explicitly granted by law, as it was at the time of the common state, namely in Minority Language Act 184/1999 Zb. in Slovakia and in Administrative Act 500/2004 Coll. in the Czech Republic. TV reports in the other language are broadcast untranslated in both countries. Some Slovaks living in the Czech Republic speak a mixed language, colloquially known as “Czechoslovakian” (“českoslovenština”) . A well-known example of this were the speeches given by the last Czechoslovak communist president, Gustáv Husák (“husákovština”) .

alphabet

→ Main article : Czech alphabet

Czech is written using the Latin alphabet , with diacritical marks such as B. the Hatschek (Czech for tick ) - differentiated.

A , Á , B , C , Č , D , Ď , E , É , Ě , F , G , H , Ch , I , Í , J , K , L , M , N , Ň , O , Ó , P , Q , R , Ř , S , Š , T , Ť , U , Ú , Ů , V , W , X , Y , Ý , Z , Ž .

a , á , b , c , č , d , ď , e , é , ě , f , g , h , ch , i , í , j , k , l , m , n , ň , o , ó , p , q , r , ř , s , š , t , ť , u , ú , ů , v , w , x , y , ý , z , ž .

When sorting and in directories (phone book) and dictionaries, the letters Č , Ch , Ř , Š , and Ž are placed as separate letters. (Ch also counts as a letter and follows the H!). The remaining letters with diacritical marks are treated in the same way as the previous letter. For example, pět (“five”) precedes petrklíč (“ cowslip ”). If two words differ only in the diacritical mark, first the word with the single letter and then the other, i.e. pas (= “pass”), comes before pás (= “belt”).

pronunciation

Basic rules

• The emphasis is basically on the first syllable of the word, more precisely the "phonetic word" (in the case of compounds with a preposition on the preposition - e.g. do školy [ ˈdɔʃkɔli ] (do schkoli)). The difference between stressed and unstressed syllables is less than in German.
• The čárka ( acute ) marks long vowels (á, é, í, ó, ý, ú) as well as the kroužek (Krouschek spinning top ) at ů , which is written (for historical reasons) in the middle and at the end of the word. These signs also occur in unstressed syllables, as they are not related to the stress, but only indicate the quantity (length) of the vowels.
• The háček (hat check, tick) changes sibilants from s [ s ] to š [ ʃ ] (sch) etc. or palatalizes (softens) d , t , n and r . With lower case d and t it is graphically similar to an apostrophe (ď, ť) .
• ě is spoken as ever , except after d , t and n , where it triggers their softening (→ děd [ ɟɛt ] etc.), and after m , where it is pronounced like [ ɲɛ ] (e.g. město [ mɲɛstɔ ] ).
• Before ě and i , the consonants d, t and n are pronounced softly, i.e. i.e., articulated with an echo of a j after the consonant. The tongue goes to the front of the palate (e.g. dítě [ ɟicɛ ], někdo [ ɲɛgdɔ ], nic [ ɲɪt͡s ]).
• There is no -ck-, the two letters are always spoken separately.

table

Characters	Phonetic signs	description	example
a	[⁠ a ⁠]	Unrounded open front tongue vowel , like German: a in: "Fall"	tam , lampa
á	[ aː ]	Unrounded open front tongue vowel , like German: aa in: "Saal"	máte , velká
ouch	[ aʊ̯ ]	Diphthong , as German: au in: "Auto"	automobile
c	[⁠ ts ⁠]	Affricates , like German: tz ; z in: "cat"; "Sugar", also before consonants ( ck [tsk]) and dark vowels	cukr , německý
č	[⁠ tʃ ⁠]	Affricate , as German: Tsch in: "Matsch", "Tschüss"	Čech , časem
ch	[⁠ x ⁠]	Voiceless velar fricative , like German: ch in: "Bach", "Nacht" (also at the beginning of the word)	chodba , trochu
ď	[⁠ ɟ ⁠]	Voiced palatal plosive , like German: dj	maďarský
dě	[ ɟɛ ]	Voiced palatal plosive before e, as in German: dje	děti
di	[ ɟi ]	Voiced palatal plosive before i, like German: dji	divadlo
e	[⁠ ɛ ⁠]	Unrounded half-open front tongue vowel , like German: ä in: "would"	je , dveře
é	[ ɛː ]	Unrounded, half-open front tongue vowel , like German: ä in: "Räte"	mléko , černé
ě	[ jɛ ]	as in German: ever in: now	věda , věc
eu	[ ɛʊ̯ ]	Diphthong , but with separate pronunciation of e and u	leukemia , euro
H	[⁠ ɦ ⁠]	Voiced glottal fricative , further ahead than German: h in "hold" (also before and after consonants and in the final part)	hora , zahrada
i , y , j (before consonant)	[⁠ ı ⁠]	Unrounded centralized almost closed front tongue vowel , like German: i in: "Tip"	židle , tady
í , ý	[ iː ]	Unrounded closed front tongue vowel , like German: i in: "Biene" bílý> bielie (white)	bílý
j	[⁠ j ⁠]	Voiced palatal approximant , like German: j in: "Jagd"	její jméno
mě	[ mɲɛ ]		město
ň	[⁠ ɲ ⁠]	Voiced palatal nasal , simultaneous articulation of n and j , similar to it. or French: gn in Bologna or Champagne ; span .: ñ in: señora	buňka , Plzeň
ni , ně	[ ɲi ], [ ɲɛ ]		není Němec
O	[ ɔ̹ ]	Rounded half-open back vowel , like German: o in: "Gott"	okno
O	[ ɔ̹ː ]	Rounded half-open back vowel , like German: o in: "folder"	citrón , gól
ou	[ ɔʊ̯ ]	Diphthong , with sliding from o to u mo_udrie (long i), neso_u	moudrý , nesou
r	[⁠ r ⁠]	Voiced alveolar vibrant , "tongue tip-r" with more beats than the German "tongue r"	rada
ř	[ r̝ ]	laminal vibrant , simultaneous (!) articulation of "tongue-r" and French: j [ʒ] '	řeka , Dvořák
s	always [⁠ s ⁠]	Voiceless alveolar fricative , like German: ß the “sharp S” does not appear in German in the initial sound.	starý, sýr
š	[⁠ ʃ ⁠]	Voiceless postalveolar fricative , like German: sch in: "quickly"	šest , šiška
ť	[⁠ c ⁠]	Voiceless palatal plosive , something like German: tj in: "Matjes", pronunciation: shtjaava (long a), batja	šťáva , Baťa
tě , ti	[ cɛ ], [ ci ]	Voiceless palatal plosive before e and i , like German: tje, tji	tisíc [cisiːts]
u	[⁠ u ⁠]	Rounded closed back vowel , like German: u in: "Music"	guma , vzadu
ú , ů	[ uː ]	Rounded closed back vowel , like German: u in: "Pute"	úterý , stůl
v	[⁠ v ⁠]	Voiced labiodental fricative , something like German: w in: "wild"	voda
w	[⁠ v ⁠]
x	[⁠ ks ⁠]
z	[⁠ z ⁠]	Voiced alveolar fricative , such as B. German: s in: "Rose", English: z in zero	nazdar , zdrž , fyzika
ž	[⁠ ʒ ⁠]	Voiced postalveolar fricative , like French: j in: Journal , toujours	žena , žurnál , želé

Phonology

Vowels

Czech vowels ( IPA )

There are short and long vowels.

short	long	comment
a	á
e	é	[⁠ ɛ ⁠] / [ ɛː ]
ě		[ jɛ ]; softens (palatalizes) the preceding consonants t , d and n
i	í	[⁠ ı ⁠] / [ i ] - if short much more open (such as in Engl..); except for foreign words, it softens (palatalizes) preceding consonants t , d and n
O	O	[⁠ ɔ ⁠] , long [ ɔː ] comes only in foreign words as balkón (balcony) or interjections such Ó! (Oh!) Before
u	ú / ů	The character ú is used at the beginning of the word, mostly ů in the interior of the word , e.g. B. únor (February) and Bůh (God). Exceptions: in foreign words like súra (sura) or after prefixes like neúplatný (incorruptible).
y	ý	[⁠ ı ⁠] / [ i ] - as i / í , but changed foregoing consonants

In certain contexts, long vowels alternate with short ones, cf. for example hlava (head) and hlávka (little head) or mýt (wash) and myji (I wash). For historical reasons, however, the short vowel does not always correspond to the corresponding long vowel, rather the relationships are sometimes more complicated. They can be represented as follows:

a	á
e	é
ě	í
i	í
O	ů
u	ú (at the beginning of the word)
u	ou (inside the word)
y	ý

Certain consonants can act as vowels and form syllables: r , l and (rarely) m . There are also words that only consist of consonants, cf. for example krk "neck", blb "stupid" or scvrnkls "you flicked [it] down". The Czech sentence without vowels is known: Strč prst skrz krk .

Diphthongs

In Czech today there are the diphthongs ou , au and eu . The diphthong ou is also common in Czech words and especially proper names, while au and eu only occur in foreign words or interjections.

• The diphthong au is pronounced like in German, e.g. B. auto [ ˈaʊ̯tɔ ].
• When pronouncing the diphthong ou , an open o and an unsyllabic open u are combined, e.g. B. louka [ ˈloʊ̯ka ] "meadow".
• When pronouncing the diphthong eu , an open e and an unsyllabic u are combined, e.g. B. leukemia [ ˈlɛʊ̯kɛːmɪjɛ ]. The diphthong is not pronounced as it is in German.

If two vowels meet on a syllable border , they are not considered a diphthong and are separated with a glottal stroke if pronounced carefully . This difference is not visible in the typeface; see. použít [ ˈpoʔʊʒiːt ] “use”, neučím [ ˈnɛʔutʃiːm ] “I do not teach”.

Consonants

In the Czech spelling, a distinction is traditionally made between so-called hard, neutral and soft consonants. Clear symmetry can only be seen in the hard consonants d , t , n and their soft equivalents ď , ť , ň (which are pronounced differently from e.g. the soft d , t , n in Russian), in the remaining cases it is a rather historical distinction, but it has consequences for spelling and makes it difficult for native speakers to learn. Czech children therefore learn in elementary school to say those words with neutral consonants in which an [i] is written as y (so-called vyjmenovaná or vybraná slova or “selected words”).

Hard consonants

Characters	example
H	hotel, Praha
ch	chyba, Čech
G	guma, magnetophone
k	křeslo, vlaky
r	ráno, dobrý
d	dáme, everyone
t	tabule, stůl
n	noc, ten

In orthography one writes the sound [i] with y after these consonants. Exceptions are a few foreign words such as 'chirurg', 'kilometr' and 'kino'.

The h is never silent. Typically it takes an etymological g , e.g. B. 'hrob' ('grave', Polish 'grób'), 'hranice' ('border', Serbo-Croatian and Polish 'granica'), noha (foot, leg, Polish noga). The sound and letter g , on the other hand, occur almost exclusively in foreign words.

Soft consonants

Characters	example
ž	židle , leží
š	šest , sešit
č	černý , večer
ř	středa , říká
c	co , mloci
j	jaký , jídlo
ď	Maďarsko
ť	chuť
ň	skříň

Hard final consonants in conjunction with suffixes on e and i are exchanged for soft ones: -ch  + ě / i becomes -še / -ši , and -cký becomes -čtí and -h  + ě / i becomes -ze / -zi , also katolický Čech z Prahy / katoličtí Češi v Praze (= "a Catholic Czech from Prague" / "Catholic Czech in Prague"). And -k  + ě / i becomes -ce / -ci , and -ský becomes -ští , i.e. český žák  → čeští žáci (= "the Czech pupil" / "the Czech pupil"). While there is only one palatalization level for ch, as for most other (in Czech) palatalizable consonants, for example ucho (= "ear") / uši (= "ears"), there are two levels for h , k and g : Praha / v Praze / Pražský ("Prague" / "in Prague" / "Prager"), dívka / dívce / dívčí ("(a) girl" / "(a) girl" / "girl-").

Neutral consonants (hermaphrodite sounds)

Characters	example
b	tabule , být , bída
f	fyzika , fičet
l	leží , lysý , list
m	mám , myš , míchat
p	pán , pyšný , píchnout
s	sešit , sýr , prosím
v	velký , výr , vichřice
z	zítra , jazyk

In orthography, after these consonants in "selected words" and some foreign words, write an [i] like y , otherwise like i . The f and g appear almost exclusively in foreign words. In loan words, the f is often replaced by b , for example in barva (color) .

grammar

Declination and conjugation are done using endings (and / or small changes in the stem). There are several declensions and several conjugations, as well as numerous irregularities. The word order is relatively free and allows stylistic differentiations.

declination

Czech is a strongly inflected language with seven grammatical cases ( nominative , genitive , dative , accusative , vocative , locative , instrumental ) in the singular and plural . As in German and the Romance languages, the grammatical gender of the nouns can also be male or female in actually genderless things. Czech has three genera , namely male, female and neuter, with the male gender additionally differentiating between "animate" and "inanimate" (this distinction is partly purely grammatical; humans and animals are mostly classified as "animate", but there are terms for people and animals that are grammatically "inanimate" and terms for inanimate objects that are grammatically "animate").

As in Latin and most Slavic languages, there are neither definite nor indefinite articles in the written language. In everyday language, however, the demonstrative pronouns ten , ta , to (literally this , this , this ) can be used in the article function, e.g. E.g .: (Ten) pán se podíval na (toho) psa (The Lord looked at the dog). The articles in the Germanic and Romance languages ​​developed from the use of the demonstratives in everyday language.

Many adjectives and participles have a short form and a long form, both of which can be declined according to gender, number and case. The short form always has the function of a predicative (expressed in German with a form of the verb sein and the unflexed adjective) and has a reduced paradigm . While the short form of adjectives is used almost exclusively in the upscale style, the use of the short / long forms of participles in the periphrastic passive voice is also used in colloquial language , e.g. E.g .: okno bylo zavřeno (process passive : "the window was closed") vs. okno bylo zavřené (state passive: "the window was closed")

A considerable number of nouns are declined like adjectives, a phenomenon not foreign to German.

Names

As in other Slavic languages, female surnames have a special form derived from the male name. They are usually identified by the suffix -ová . In the case of adjectival surnames that end in -ý , on the other hand, only a -á is added (Ms. Tichý is therefore not called paní Tichová , but Tichá ). Another exception also applies to surnames, the form of which is based on a genitive form of family affiliation, here the feminine form is identical to the masculine form. The name of the composer's wife Martinů is simply paní Martinů ("Frau Martinů").

The reason for this is that the ending -ová of a woman's surname indicates who she “belongs to”. The word ending in -ová is originally a possessive adjective formed by adding -ův , -ova or -ovo to a masculine noun.

In the Czech Republic this method is often used in names of foreign origin, e.g. B. in Zdeňka Müllerová as well as with foreigners like Angela Merkelov á, Céline Dionov á or Hillary Clintonov á. This was justified with the Czech declination. Names are declined quite normally. Example: nominative - To je Steffi Grafová. (= "This is Steffi Graf."), Accusative - Vidím Steffi Grafovou. (= "I see Steffi Graf.") A similar procedure is used in the Baltic, but also in the Latin language, in order to clearly mark the grammatical case.

If a woman takes on the name of her husband when she marries, then with non-Czech names she is free to choose whether to accept the name in the female form - as described above - or unchanged.

Geographical names on o are in Czech Neutra: Slovensko ( Slovakia ), Lipsko ( Leipzig ), Slezsko ( Silesia ).

The numerous place names on -vice and -nice are mostly grammatical plural ( pluraliatantum ). This also applies to names such as Čechy ( Bohemia ) or Hradčany ( Hradschin ). These are also names in the grammatical plural, such as B. the common noun hodiny (= "the clock", literally: "the hours").

conjugation of verbs

The conjugation of Czech verbs is based on person (ich, du, er / she / es… - as in German), number (singular, plural) and tense (present, past, future).

A typical peculiarity of Czech verbs is that they form aspect pairs. Most verbs have a perfective / completed (one-time action) and imperfective / unfinished form (principal, frequently recurring action). The aspects are expressed partly by suffixes (usually imperfecting perfect verbs), partly by prefixes (usually perfecting imperfect verbs), in a few cases also by two different stems.

There is a close correlation between aspect and tense. Only imperfective verbs form a present tense, the present tense of perfect verbs has a futuristic meaning. There is also an imperfective future tense circumscribed with the auxiliary verb být (= "to be"). The past tense is also formed with the auxiliary verb být (= "to be") and occurs in both aspects.

See the following example:

imperfect verb dělat "to do"

• dělám = "I do", děláš "you do" etc.
• dělal / dělala jsem = "I did", dělal / dělala jsi = "you did" etc., but in the 3rd person without auxiliary verb: dělal = "he did", dělala = "she did", dělali / dělaly = " they did";
• budu dělat = "I will do", budeš dělat = "you will do" etc.

perfect verb udělat "to do"

• udělal / udělala jsem = "I did", udělal / udělala jsi = "you did", udělal = "he did", udělala = "she did" etc.
• udělám = "I will do", uděláš = "you will do" etc.

Other verbal categories in linguistics are mode (indicative, imperative, conditional) and diathesis (active and passive).

Czech (like the other Slavic languages) differentiates between the past participle used for the past tense and the past participle: slyšel jsem / slyšela jsem 'I heard', jsem slyšen / jsem slyšena 'I am heard'.

Adverbs

As in German, there are also adverbs in the Czech language . There are local adverbs, adverbs of time, indefinite and negative adverbs, and adverbs derived from adjectives. Local adverbs answer the question where (left, right, up, down, front, back, in the middle, here and there) and where (to the left, to the right ...), adverbs of the time the question how often (daily, weekly, monthly, yearly). Indefinite adverbs (e.g. někdo = someone) and negative adverbs (nikdo = nobody) are derived from pronouns (e.g. kdo = who). After the adverbs derived from adjectives, as is asked. The adverb derived from the adjective usually has the ending -e, -ě. When deriving adjectives that end in -ký, the adverb ends in -ce, often with -o. Adverbs from adjectives ending in -rý end in -ře ( palatalization ). If the adjective ends in -cký or -ský, the adverbs have -ky at the end (německý - německy, český - česky). There are, for example, dobře (from dobrý, -á, -é), špatně (from špatný, -á, -é), pomalu (from pomalý, -á, -é), dlouho (from dlouhý, -á, -é) etc.
Adverbs can be heightened like adjectives. The increase is usually done by adding the suffix -eji to or prefixing nej- in front of the word stem. Example: rychle - rychleji - nejrychleji.
The following consonant
changes occur with the stem end: -h- → -ž-; -ch- → -š-; -k- → -č-; -sk- → -št-; -ck- → -čt-.
Examples: divoký - divočejší, lidský - lidštější
In addition, there are irregular increases such as dobře - lépe - nejlépe, špatně - hůř (e) - nejhůř (e) and increases that are difficult to form. The forms of increase can be found in the dictionaries. However, there are also tables for this.

numbers

The numbers from 21 to 99 can be spoken in two ways. For example, in addition to dvacet tři (comparable to the Latin viginti trēs , German literally twenty three ) there is also třiadvacet (literally twenty-three ). This phenomenon can be explained by the centuries-long German-Czech language contact.

As in other Slavic languages, nouns after indefinite numeral words and certain numeral words from pět (five) in the genitive plural, if the numeral is in the nominative, genitive or accusative, e.g. čtyři hrady / pět hradů (four / five castles), tři koruny / třicet korun / tři sta korun / pět set korun (three / 30/300/500 crowns). In the other cases, the numeric and noun congruence regularly, e.g. na pěti hradech (locative).

Language example

Universal Declaration of Human Rights , Article 1:

"Všichni lidé rodí se svobodní a sobě rovní co do důstojnosti a práv. Jsou nadáni rozumem a svědomím a mají spolu jednat v duchu bratrství. "

German: All people are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should meet one another in a spirit of brotherhood.

Loanwords

German loanwords in Czech

For historical reasons, Czech (and Slovak) contain a relatively large number of German loanwords. A distinction must be made between those that have been naturalized for a very long time and are used in the standard language as well as in the dialects, and those that are only used in so-called Common Czech .

The first group includes:

• brýle , from: "glasses",
• cíl , from: "goal",
• farář , from: "Pastor",
• flétna , from: "flute",
• haléř , from: "Heller",
• knedlík , from: "Knödel",
• knoflík , from: "button",
• muset , from: "must",
• nudle , from: "Nudel (n)",
• sál , from: "hall",
• šunka , from: "ham",
• švagr , from: "brother-in-law",
• talíř , from: "plate",
• taška , from: "bag",
• valčík , from: "Waltz" and
• žold , from: "Sold".

The second group includes:

• buřt , from: Wurst (dialect from Bavarian: "Wurscht").
• flaška , from: "bottle",
• hajzl = vulgar: "toilet" (dialectal from Bavarian: "Haisl (little house)") - "I go to the Haisl ." = "Jdu na hajzl." ,
• jo , from: "ja" (dialect from Bavarian / Austrian : jo ),
• kšeft , from "business",
• ksicht of "face", with ksicht in Czech grimace means and is limited to ironic or vulgar context; obličej = "face".
• ksindl , from "rabble" as well
• nášup , from "supply", "supply" (eg: food).

Czech loanwords in German

Here, too, a distinction must be made between two groups, first those words that are common in German, and then those that are particularly characteristic of Austria.

The first group includes:

• " Baude ", mountain hut, from synonymous with bouda
• " Bomätscher " (Saxon), ship puller, towman , from pomáhač (= "helper")
• " Furiant ": folk dance
• " Howitzer ", houfnice - the name for a gun comes from the 15th century
• " Seal ", from pečeť (= "seal"), a stamp
• " Polka ": folk dance
• “Pistol”: derived from píšťala - name for firearms in the Middle Ages
• " Quark ", from: synonymous: tvaroh
• " Robot ": artificial people, derived from robota (= "Fronarbeit"); Word creation by Josef Čapek , first published in Karel Čapek's socially utopian drama R. U. R. (1920/1921)
• " Schmetten ": synonymous with smetana , derived from it: "butterfly"
• "Trabant": from drabant , Landsknecht at the time of the Hussite Wars
• " Siskin ": from čížek
• " Ziesel ": from sysel
• “ Plum ”: from švestka

The second group includes:

• " Buchtel " ("steam noodle"), from: buchta
• " Kolatsche " ("Quarktasche"), from: koláče
• “Kren” (“ horseradish ”), from: křen
• " Kukuruz " ("corn"), from: kukuřice
• " Pawlatsch ", arcade, from pavlač
• “Plazen” (“to cry”, dialectal), from: plakat
• "Pomali" ("slow", dialectal), from: pomali (= "slow" in Moravian language )
• " Powidl " ("plum jam "), from: povidla
• " Sliwowitz " ("plum schnapps "), from: slivovice
• "Tschapperl" ("clumsy man"), from: čapek or cápek (= "inexperienced man" or "stupid" in Moravian language )
• "Tuchent" ("blanket"), from: duchna

Literature on Czech as a foreign language

• Helena Remediosová, Elga Čechová: Chcete mluvit česky . Liberec, 2010, ISBN 978-80-86727-22-6 (Czech).

Web links

Wiktionary: Czech  - explanations of meanings, origins of words, synonyms, translations

Commons : Czech language  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Commons : Czech pronunciation  - album with pictures, videos and audio files

Wikiquote: Czech Proverbs  - Quotes

Wikibooks: Czech  - learning and teaching materials

• Entry on the Czech language in the Encyclopedia of the European East ( Memento from October 12, 2017 in the Internet Archive )
• Link catalog on the subject of the Czech language at curlie.org (formerly DMOZ )
• Czech , compact grammar by Laura Janda and Charles Townsend (English, PDF 869 KB)
• A Grammar of Czech as a Foreign Language , by Karel Tahal (English, PDF; 1.8 MB)
• Czech – German / –English / –Italian / –French / –Spanish / –Russian dictionary , www.slovnik.seznam.cz
• German-Czech context dictionary with 1.3 million bilingual example sentences

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Reservations and Declarations for Treaty No.148 Council of Europe
2. ^ Lewis, M. Paul, Gary F. Simons, Charles D. Fennig: Ethnologue: Languages ​​of the World . 9th edition. Dallas 2016 data online (English)
3. ↑ Tomasz Jurek: The document language in medieval Silesia ( Memento from April 28, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) , elec.enc.sorbonne.fr (German / French)
4. ^ První česká beseda v Brně
5. ↑ Petr Karlík, Marek Nekula, Jana Pleskalová: Encyklopedický slovník češtiny ( cs ). Nakladatelství lidové noviny, 2002, ISBN 80-7106-484-X , p. 393.
6. ↑ Markéta Kachlíková: Slovak is a foreign language for young Czechs. Radio Prague , February 27, 2013, accessed June 21, 2013 . 
7. ↑ Another example is the entrepreneur Andrej Babiš in the talk show Jana Krause (September 22, 2011), online
8. ↑ Johann Negedly : Czech grammar . Prague 1804, p. 3 and p. 10: “§. 8. […] this creates a double sound or diphthong. We have six such double sounds: au, ay (áy), ey, iy, oy, uy (ůy). "And" §. 20. The Bohemians have six double sounds: au, ay (áy) ey, iy, oy, uy, (ůy), (see § 8). “
   Practical Bohemian grammar for Germans. Second revised and improved edition. Prague 1809, p. 3 and p. 5: “§. 4. […] From these six simple vowels, the double voices emerge through various combinations; they are as follows: au, ay (áy), ey, iy, oy, uy (ůy). "and" §. 12. The Bohemians have six double sounds: au, ay (áy), ey, iy, oy, uy (ůy) s. §. 4. "
9. ^ Keyword: seal duden.de
10. ^ Keyword Schmetten duden.de