Archives for: September 2011, 27
Шесть
September 27th, 2011 by DonThe most common Russian word for six is шесть, which declines like this:
| Nom | шесть |
| Acc | |
| Gen | шести |
| Pre | |
| Dat | |
| Ins | шестью |
When шесть occurs in oblique cases (oblique means a case other than nominative or accusative), it works pretty well like we would expect from a theoretical point of view; that is, it declines as we would expect and the noun it quantifies shows up in the same case in the plural:
| Gen | Мы в центре гуляли около шести часов. | We walked around downtown for about six hours. |
| Pre | Мы поговорили о шести новых книгах. | We talked about six new books. |
| Dat | Я звонил шести новым студентам. | I phoned six new students. |
| Ins | Над шестью американскими беглецами кружился вертолёт. | A helicopter circled over the six American fugitives. |
Now here's the weird part... If шесть is part of a nominative case number phrase or an accusative case number phrase, then the noun it quantifies shows up in the genitive plural:
| На сцене пели шесть красивых украинок. | Six beautiful Ukrainian women were singing on the stage. |
| Я купил шесть немецких машин. | I bought six German cars. |
That may seem quite complex. Just be glad your not studying Polish: its number system is even more freakish... and fascinating.
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