Hostname: page-component-74656f9884-g96k6 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2026-11-10T16:31:01.169Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Ukrainian System of Declension

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 April 2026

W. K. Matthews
W. K. Matthews*
Affiliation:
University of London
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Analysis of the grammatically complete sentence in Ukrainian reveals, as elsewhere in Indo-European, the familiar ‘logical’ polarity of subject and predicate. The nucleus of the subject is preponderantly a nominal element, that of the predicate a verbal one; apart from their characteristic suffixes of derivation, the first is defined morphologically by a system of declension, the second by a system of conjugation, i.e. by two contrasting patterns of flexion. The fact of flexion itself serves as a criterion to discriminate between the inflected and the uninflected lexical constituents (lexemes) of the language. The nominal system is, if anything, rather more involved than the verbal and covers the expression of a series of notional categories, only some of which (e.g. person and number) it shares with the verb. Selected case-relations are represented by more or less characteristic morphemes, and the variety of these is multiplied by the demands of gender and number.

Information

Type
Research Article
Information
Language , Volume 25 , Issue 2: Apr-June , June 1949 , pp. 117 - 129
Copyright
Copyright © 1949 Linguistic Society of America

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable

References

1 N. Trubetzkoy, Das morphonologische System der russischen Sprache (Prague, 1933).

2 The morphological illustrations in this paper are drawn from the following works: A. Krymskij, Ukrainskaja grammatika I, II (Moscow, 1907–8); S. Smal′-Stoćkyj and T. Gartner, Grammatik der ruthenischen (ukrainischen) Sprache (Vienna, 1913); S. Smal′-Stoćkyj, Ruthenische Grammatik (Berlin, 1913); V. Simovyč, Gramatyka ukraïnśkoï movy (Leipzig, 1919); Narodnyj Komisariat Osvity URSR, Ukraïnśkyj pravopys (Kiev, 1946); B. Hrinčenko, Slovaŕ ukraïnśkoï movy I–IV (Kiev, 1907–9); Z. Kuzelja, J. Rudnyćkyj, and K. H. Meyer, Ukraïnśko-nimećkyj slovnyk (Leipzig, 1943); M. J. Kalinovič, Russko-ukrainskij slovaŕ (Moscow, 1948).

3 The vestigial dual found in a few feminine and neuter nouns is associated with the numerals 2, 3, 4. The feminine nominative-accusative dual is identical in form with the dative-locative singular (e.g. rybi ‘two fishes’), the neuter with the corresponding locative singular (e.g. tili ‘two bodies’). The dual, accordingly, does not add to the sum total of Ukrainian case endings.

4 For the title of his grammar see fn. 2.

5 See my forthcoming review of this work in The Slavonic and East European Review (London).

6 Ruthenische Grammatik (cf. fn. 2).

7 F. Oberpfalcer, Rod jmen v češtině (Prague, 1933).

8 The orthographic reform of 1945 has restricted the use of this letter (phonetically ji) to initial position (e.g. ïch ‘their, them’) and to the position after a vowel, a palatal consonant indicated in the spelling by the ‘soft sign’ (m'jakyj znak), or a non-palatal consonant followed by an apostrophe (e.g. moï ‘my’, Vińï ‘Vigny’, z'ïzd ‘congress’). See Ukraïnśkyj pravopys 8.

9 See fn. 1.

10 The variant n-forms are differently spelt from the normal ones: compare ïï and neï, ïch and nich, joho and ńoho.

11 In some languages, for instance the West Somian (W. Finnic), nouns and adiectives are not formally differentiated.

12 V. Simovyč, op.cit. (fn. 2).