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- Topic: Polish >
- "Statek płynie po jeziorze."
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You'd have to change the ship into a submarine in order for that propositional change to make sense.
Which propositional change? Did you mean to respond to ardecarlo (on --> in)? It would be nice, if you used the "Reply" option right below the comment you are responding to (or to quote the OP). This way it would be nested rather than listed independently.
I'm curious why this is not correct? It would be correct to say the ship is sailing in the lake or sea in English, so is it just not the correct translation? Because after all, a significant part of the ship will be displaced in the lake, so something does not require to be submerged to be classified as 'in'. I think with something less displaced like a boat you might choose to use 'on' more but you'll certainly see 'in' being used plenty when referring to water without being submerged.
Its's just po + Locative is much more commonly used with movement while na + locative with state/location. One can use na + Accusative to express some movement like changing between water bodies.
- Statek jest na jeziorze. The ship is on the lake.
- Statek płynie po jeziorze. The ship sails on the lake.
- Statek płynie prosto na górę lodową (accusative). The ship sails straight towards the iceberg.
- Statek wpływa na morze. (accusative). The ship enters the sea.
Could "The ship is sailing around on the lake" be an accepted answer? One of the hints for the "po" was "around" as well as "on." Okcydent also explains that "po" indicates motion.
Unfortunately I used 'over' the lake . Even though I checked afterwards on the hint I guess 'po' hardly means 'over'.
Po can be from (but not according to my dictionary on I t could now be on a river or canal. Shouldn't from be accepted?
Right now I can't even think of a context where "po" translates to "from" (but there may be one, sure), but I am certain that "from a pond" is not what the Polish sentence means.
There might be a literal translation where this applies, but in this semantic context, "po" and "from" are not the same.
Would the translation "the ship is floating on the lake" also work? "płynąć" also means to float, or just to "sail"?
Płynąć is a so-called determinate verb of motion, which means that the movement of the ship is strictly directional. 'Floating on' doesn't convey this meaning.
