This page is for my own reference, since I haven't taught any of these concepts yet. But you can study it if you want.
Unstressed Forms
Nominative Accusative Dative Acc. Contracted Form Dat. Contracted form:
eu mă îmi m mi
tu te îți te ți
el îl îi l i
ea o îi o i
noi ne ne ne ne
voi vă vă vă vă
ei îi le i le
ele le le le le The progression from accusative to dative follows a logical progression:
Singular Dative = Masculine Plural Accusative
Plural Dative = Feminine Plural Accusative
Progression of Datives:
Singular Accusative-> Masc. Plural Accusative -> Feminine Plural Accusative
îl, o Sing. Dative Plural Dative
îi le
So the plural (remember, plural is like Italian: -i, -e) is more "dative"-sounding than the singular, and the feminine (-le) is more "dative" sounding than the masculine. This can be remembered because women are anatomical "receivers," which is a dative concept.
This the progression goes like this:
Singular Stressed Forms/Prepositional Forms
eu mine mie
tu tine tie
el el lui
ea ea ei
noi noi nouă
voi voi vouă ei ei lor
ele ele lor
Reflexive Unstressed Forms
se își
Reflexive Stressed Forms
sine sieși
Mneumonic Device for Untressed Pronouns: Subj AccDat Dat-Acc (Dat-Acc is the order of two-pronoun combinations)
Eu măîmi mi-m "Yeh-w muhym' meem"
Tu teîți ți-te "Tu teit's tseeteh"
El îlîi i-l "Yell uhluhy eel"
Ea oîi i-verb-o "Ya o-uhy verb-oh"
Noi nene ne-ne
Voi văvă vă-vă
Ei îile le-i "Yay uheele ley"
Ele lele le-le
Dative + Accusative "se"
mi se
ţi se
i se
i se
ni se
vi se
li le
li le
Possessives
meu mea mei mele
tău ta tăi tale
său sa săi sale | lui
său sa săi sale | ei
nostru noastră noștri noastre
vostru voastră voștri voastre
lor
lor
There are 3 genders in Romanian, instead of 2 like Spanish or French. However, they are (thankfully) not very complicated to learn.
The two main genders are masculine and feminine. The third gender is called the "neuter" by some linguists and "mixed" by others. I prefer "mixed" because the mixed gender behaves like the masculine in the singular and the feminine in the plural. The mixed gender has no articles of it's own, but takes the masculine ending in the singular and the feminine ending in the plural. We will wait to study the mixed gender until we learn the plural.
Masculine indefinite article: "a" "an" un
Feminine indefinite article: "a" "an" o
The Feminine indefinite article is o, which is confusing for Spanish and Portuguese speakers and takes some real getting used to. It is pronounced "oh." However, feminine nouns and adjectives do not end in -o, but in the familiar -ă.
o zi. a day(f) o zi bună. a good day o zi frumoasă. [frumw-aa-suh] a beautiful day.
un om a human (m), man(-kind) un om bun. a good person un om frumoș. a beautiful person. un om puternic. [pu-ter-nik] a powerful person.
o femeie [oh femey-eh] a woman o femeie bună. a good woman o femeie frumoasă. [oh femey-eh frumw-aa-suh] a beautiful woman.
o fată a girl o fată bună. a good girl o fată deșteaptă. [oh fah-tuh dish-"tapped"-duh] an intelligent girl o fată proastă. [oh fah-tuh prw-ast-uh (proastă rhymes with "So ask a (girl out)....") a stupid girl
un băiat [oon buy-"yacht" (sounds like the sailboat)] a boy un băiat bun. a good boy. un băiat prost. a dumb boy. un băiat deștépt. an intelligent boy
The first verb we are going to learn in Romanian is the verb "to be."
to be: a fi [a fee]
eu sunt [yeh-w suhnt] [the "u" in "sunt" rhymes with "put"] I am tu ești [too yesht(y)] The "i" here is to mark the palatalization [t] -> [ty] and is not a syllable. You are. el, ea este [yell, ya yesteh] he, she is noi suntem [noy suntem] we are voi sunteți [voy sun-tets(y)] The "i" here is to mark the palatalization [ts] - [tsy] and is not a syllable. You all are. ei, ele sunt [yay, yeleh suhnt] they are
Yes: "da."
No: "nu."
Bună ziua. [Boon-uh zyew-ah] Good day-the.
The difference between ă and a is important in Romanian, with ă meanin "a" or "an" and a meaning "the." ă is pronounced like "uh" in "up" or a silly person saying "duhhhh!" to make fun of someone
"a" is an "ahhh" sound like Spanish or French, pronounced between American English "hat" and American English "hot."
Conversation:
John: Búnă ziúa. Sunt John Parker.
Alina: Búnă ziúa. Eu sunt Alina Eminescu. ["yeh-w"] ... [yeh-mi-nehskuu]
John: Este o plăcere. [Yesteh oh pluh-che-reh]
Alina: Foarte mulțumită. [Fwar-teh mool-tsu-meet-uh]
John: Good day. I'm John Parker.
Alina: Good day. I'm Alina Yeminescu.
John: It's a pleasure.
Alina: Very pleased.
In order to learn Romanian, it is essential to understand a linguistic concept called "palatalization." If the learner understands palatalization, the seeming "mystery" of the language will be unlocked from the beginning.
Even though this article is technical, it is important to read it. You can't speak Romanian unless you understand this.
Palatalization is a natural process by which consonants change in a word to make them "easier to say" or "more flowing after a "y" or an "ee" sound is added to it.
English nation: From Latin "natio" (na-tee-oh) we get English "nayshun." Do you see how the "t" in "nation" is pronounced like a "sh" sound? This is because the "t" has been "palatalized."
The original Latin sound [tee] having changed to English [sh] is very common in many English words.
Latin conver-sa-tee-oh I converse --> English "conversayshun" conversation
Latin pa-tee-oh I suffer -->English "payshens" patience
Latin in-tro-duk-tee-oh I insert --> English "In-chroh-duk-shin" introduction
Spanish and French palatalized this "tee" sound to [s]. This [tee] -> [sy] version of palatalized "tee" is another common form of palatalization in many languages.
German palatalized this sound as [tsy]. Nation is pronounced [nah-tsyon] in German.
[ty] -> [tsy] is also a common form of palatalization in Romanian.
ati -> ați [atsi] "you all have"
stati -> stați [statsi] "you all stand"
mulțumit + i -> mulțumiț [multsumits] "grateful" (plural)
Another example of palatalization is the word "vision." From Latin "visio" [vizee-oh] English made [vizh-un].
This [zy] to [zh] is common in English.
Latin deci-dee-oh -> Romance deci-zee-oh -> French deci-zyo -> English "decizhun." decision
Latin kol-lee-dee-oh "collide" ------> English "collizhin." collision
In Spanish and French, the transition did not go as far as in English.
Another example of palatalization in English is the [tr] sound, which is produced in most places as [chr].
"tree" [chree]
"trip" [chrip]
"traffic" [chra-fik]
Compare to Spanish where a distinct [t] and [r] sound are heard.
tres [t-reys] tren [t-reyn] traje [t-ra-hey]
In all of these example, a consonant is being changed to a slightly different, but related, sound by adding a "y" sound after it. This "y" sound is the sound which "palatalizes" the previous consonant, or makes it change from [z] to [zh], [t] to [ts], [d] to [dj] or from [t] to [sh]. The reason it is called "palatalize" is because when your tongue makes a "y" sound, your tongue is pressed against the roof of your mouth, which is called the "palate" in linguistics.
To see this for yourself, say the sound
"eeeeeeee yeeeeeeeeeee yeeeeeeeeee yeeeeeeeeeee yeeeeeeeeeee" and notice the position of your tongue. For the sound "eeeeee" your tongue is just underneath the position to make the sound "y" which is called a "palatal" half-consonant( a "semi-vowel" in linguistic terms). When you say the sound "y" your tongue just barely-almost touches the roof of your mouth to make the "y" sound, and then returns to its slightly lower "eeeee" position.
Now try palatalizing some consonants. Say long "eeeeeeee" sounds and quickly insert the consonant while moving your tongue as little as possible.
Did you hear the strange sounding "ts"/ "ch" sound when you said the letter "t" this way? This is called a "palatalized" or "soft" t in Slavic linguistics and is used at the end of many Romanian plural words. The "normal" t is used for the singular.
Did you hear the weird "zh" sound being made when you said the letter "z" this way? This is called a "palatalized" or "soft" z in Slavic linguistics and is used in many important Romanian 2nd person verbs. The "normal" z is used as the first person.
Depending on your accent, you may have gotten a "j" sound from this or a "dz" sound from this. Both of these are palatalized forms of "d" in Slavic languages. In Romanian, palatalized "d" goes a step further than this to the palatalized "z" sound above.
Many times the "palatalized" consonant is not shown in writing with a different letter, but instead is written in Romanian by a silent letter "i" at the end of the word. The rule in Romanian is that the first i on the end of the word has no sound of its own but only means that the consonant before it is palatalized. To cheat on this before you speak Romanian fluently, think of this letter "i" as a letter "y." However, your pronunciation will sound stilted, as real Romanian speech doesn't have a "y" sound but only the different, palatalized consonant.
bani= "bany" (pronounced like Spanish bañ ) money
vezi = "vezy" you see (not "vezeee" but "vez-yah" without the "ah" vowel. This word is only one syllable).
ori = "ory" times/hours (not "or-eeee" but one syllable like "or-yah" with the "-ah" deleted.)
Sometimes, palatalization will mean that a different letter is used. Here are some common spelling changes due to palatalization:
d + i -> zi
s + i -> și "shy" (This is the Romanian letter sheh like in "shepherd")
t + i -> ți "tsy" (This is the Romanian letter tseh like in princess)
c + i -> chi "ky" (Romanian spelling is like Italian. ci = English "chee." chi= English "kee") This palatalization of the Romanian "k" sound is found in nouns.
c ["k"] + i -> ști "shty" Found in verb conjugations. When the "k" sound of a first person verb needs to be palatalized, it often changes to a "shty" sound. We will learn all this later.
Palatalization is very important in Romanian, and is used in 3 areas:
1. For forming plurals
2. For making the 2nd person singular of verbs
3. For simplifying groups of vowels into one syllable.
Good job on getting through this lesson! Don't worry, the language will come much, much easier to you now since you did this work!
Romanian is related to Spanish, French, Portuguese, and Italian. However, it also has many Russian words.
Plurals in Romanian work like Italian- instead of using the letter "s," the letter "i" is used for masculine nouns and the letter "e" is used for feminine nouns.
eu "yehw" I tu you (like Spanish) el "yell" he ea "ya" she
noi (rhymes with "noise") we voi you all (like vosotrosin Spanish or vous in French) ei "yay!" they (masculine) ele "yeleh" they (feminine)
Now let's learn the pronouns. The most confusing one is eu which sounds somewhat like English "you." However, Spanish speakers will recognize it as a distorted from of yo.
eu "yehw"
eu "yehw"
eu am who eu am. ("yeh-w am who yeh-w am.")
tu are the one I want to hire!
I wanna dance with tu!
Hey, why is el yelling at el? ("Why is "yell" yelling at "yell"?)
El is a soldier. ("yell is a soldier.") He is a solder
Ea has messy hair. ("yah has messy hair.") She has messy hair.
Ea has dark hair. ("yah has dark hair.") She has dark hair.
Let's talk about noi...Let's talk about us
Noi stick together. We stick together.
Hey guys- what are voi reading?
Hey ladies- what are voi laughing about?
He is pointing at ei. Yay! ("He is pointing at "yay.") He is pointing at them.
Ei are having a discussion. They are having a discussion.
("Yay are having a discussion.")
Ele are friends. ("Yeleh are friends." They are friends)
Yea ladies! Ele are working out at the gym. ("Yeleh")
.jpg)