A1 · The noun · about 7 minutes
No article: dom means “a house” and “the house”
definite and indefinite without articles
No “a”, no “the” — word order shows what is known and what is new.
Do you know this already?
“New to me”: the explanation first, then practice. “Test myself”: 3 short questions – get at least two right and you go straight to the harder exercises.
Words you will need4
They appear in this topic’s examples and exercises and are new at this point on the learning path.
- filmfilm, movie
- nudnyboring
- pytaniequestion
- gotowyready
Understand
RememberNo article — the position in the sentence shows what is known and what is new.
- Signal words
- ten
- ta
- to
- jakiś
- jeden
The form
The patterns at a glance
Each row first says when or what the pattern is used for, then gives an example in Polish.
| a house / the house | dom |
| what is new goes last: “a …” | Na stole leży książka. |
| what is known goes first: “the …” | Książka leży na stole. |
| this very one: ten, ta, to | Ten film jest nudny. |
| some … or other: jakiś, jakaś, jakieś | Jakaś pani pyta o ciebie. |
| exactly one: jeden, jedna, jedno | Mam jedno pytanie. |
The rules one by one
The form this topic is about
Polish has no articles; the noun stands on its own.
Mam psa i kota.I have a dog and a cat.
What is new tends to come at the end of the sentence.
Na stole leży książka.There is a book on the table.
What is already known tends to come first.
Książka leży na stole.The book is on the table.
Use ten, ta, to only when you really mean “this”.
Ten film jest nudny.This film is boring.
jeden means “one” and appears only when the number matters.
Mam jedno pytanie.I have one question.
Example sentences
Kawa jest gotowa.The coffee is ready.
Poproszę herbatę.A tea, please.
Przed domem stoi samochód.There is a car in front of the house.
7 more example sentences
Samochód stoi przed domem.The car is in front of the house.
Jakaś pani pyta o ciebie.Some woman is asking about you.
Gdzie jest klucz?Where is the key?
Na ulicy stoi autobus.There is a bus in the street.
Autobus już jedzie.The bus is coming.
Mam brata i siostrę.I have a brother and a sister.
Ta kawiarnia jest bardzo przytulna.This café is very cosy.
The trap English speakers fall into
Watch out
Missing “a” and “the”, English speakers like to fill the gap with jeden for “a” and ten for “the”. Both then say more than you mean: To jest jeden dom means “This is one single house”, and a ten before every noun sounds as if you were pointing at everything. Just let the noun stand on its own.
Quick check
A warm-up: 2 questions, answered straight away. They do not count towards your progress.
Practise
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Next on the path: 22 · The instrumental: z mamą, jestem lekarzemBack to the learning path
The full explanation
Read it all · about 1 min
Polish has no articles. dom means “house”, “a house” and “the house”, and Mam psa is “I have a dog”. What English separates with “a” and “the” usually follows from the context, and you do not have to do anything for it. For an English speaker the hard part is the opposite habit: resisting the urge to put something in front of every noun.
Where it does matter, word order helps. What is new tends to go to the end: Na stole leży książka — “There is a book on the table”. What is already known tends to go first: Książka leży na stole — “The book is on the table”. The same words, two meanings — English uses “there is … a” for the first and “the” for the second.
To say “this” or “that” explicitly, use ten, ta, to; for “some” in the sense of “some woman or other”, jakiś, jakaś, jakieś. jeden, jedna, jedno, on the other hand, is the number “one”, not an article. Use it only when the number counts: Mam jedno pytanie — “I have one question”.
Worth knowing1
Worth knowing
The information moves, not the article
In English you change the article and keep the order: “A man is coming in”, “The man is coming in”. In Polish the word stays the same and the order changes: Wchodzi panfor “a man”Pan wchodzifor “the man”
Do sklepu wchodzi pan z psem.A man with a dog comes into the shop.
The verbs on this page, in every form: być · stać · mieć · leżeć · pytać