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- "Он не знает моё имя."
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имя is neuter, like время. There are a handful of nouns ending in 'я' that are neuter. And моё is the neuter form of мой.
1494
Something interesting I found at Wiktionary about words like имя or вре́мя (which share the same case of declension):
"The so-called н-declension of this and a dozen other similar neuter nouns stems from the fact that the word-final -я was the nasal vowel Ѧ, ѧ (little yus) in Old Church Slavonic and Late Proto-Slavic, resulting in the -ен- before all the case endings in the modern language. Compare the declension of Old Church Slavonic имѧ (imę)."
Why not моего? о.О I'd expect "Он знает моё имя", but "Он не знает моего имени"...
Okay, so how does this work grammatically, that both are possible? It seems this is the first time so far when grammatical transfer from Polish fails me, I'd expect Genitive for не знать and Accusative for знать...
It does not work that way in Russian. In modern Russian objects of most negative verbs generally stay Accusative (иметь is the major exception) while some verbs taking abstract objects like Genitive more. It is technically possible to use a Genitive object with many other negated verbs. However, this sounds stronger and often—old-fashioned. In some cases Genitive is associated with excluding any objects of the kind whereas Accusative suggests a more definite object.
A century ago most verbs would, probably, use Genitive in negative sentences.
The issue of choosing the correct case here is very complicated and is way beyond what this course can teach you. A beginner should know that не иметь always uses Genitive and that many abstract objects used with verbs of quite abstract meaning will also use Genitive when negated. Set expressions should be memorized:
- не обращать внимания = to not pay any attention
- не вызывать сомнений = to cause no doubts
- не видеть смысла = to not see any point
Verbs of visual and auditory perception may also switch to Genitive (the interpretation being "we trust what we see and hear, so if we do not see or here something, it probably is not there"). This actually extends to subjects of perception predicates ("is visible", "is audible"):
- Я не видел дома. = I did not see the house.
- Я не слышал шума. = I did not hear any noise.
- В соседней комнате музыки не было слышно. = The music "was not audible" in the adjacent room.
- Тебя отсюда не видно. = You are "not visible" from here.
Wow, this is quite an answer... and some difficult stuff. Thank you for this food for thought :)
one correction, here:
Я не видел дом. = I did not see the house.
or
Я не видел этот (тот) дом. = I did not see the (this, that) house.
or
Я не видел этого (того) дома. = I did not see the (this, that) house.
or
Я не видел дома. = I did not see the houses. (множественное число)
just because Я не видел дома ...can only be part of other sentences I think (или должно быть привязно по смыслу)
- Почему ты врезался на машине в этот дом?
- Я не видел дома.
дома also can be at home but I can't provide good example
Thanks! What about not leaving a message? For example, Вам кто-то звонил, но он не оставил сообщения. Or is it сообщение?
sigh I really do wish D. would let me copy and paste from the app. This is clearly information that will be useful lateron...
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зовут means "call". Lots of languages use the structure of "they call me " (Hebrew, for one) or "I call myself " (French and Spanish both us this).
In Bulgarian (as in the slavic family of languages), too: Аз се казвам / Казвам се (= I call myself) and also Името ми е (= My name is).
Funnily enough, и́мя is declined neither like the other ending in я (2nd declension f. nouns), nor like other neuter nouns (1st declension).
It belongs to the 3rd declension (normally, f. nouns ending in ь).
I have a strong feeling that weird stuff like this is somehow linked to palatisation, the soft sign and the great spelling reform during communism... Does anyone know some facts about this?
Anyway. gs. и́мени, npl. имена́, gpl. имён (pre-reform имёнъ)
So npl. and gpl. do not follow regular 3rd declension. But they aren't marked in Wiktionary as being irregular - why?
On the last bit, the speaker sounded like a mumbling teenager. I couldn't understand it!
Моё sounds like Моя on Android cell phones. It seems that each Duo language course has its audio problems...
