"Εγώ είμαι ένας άντρας."
Translation:I am a man.
28 CommentsThis discussion is locked.
231
For the record, nobody would say it like that in real life (even though it's grammatically correct).
To say "I'm a man" in Greek, we'd just say "είμαι άντρας". "Εγώ" isn't needed since it's already included in the verb (είμαι means "I am"). "Ένας" is also unnecessarily since it would be impossible to say "I am two (or three, or four) men" and άντρας is singular anyway.
If you want to give emphasis to the amount of men. For example "ένας" is also 'one" so you could be saying "I am only one man" Or if you want to give emphasis to the fact that you're a man. Like "I am a man"
But in general it is really no different , just another way of saying "εγώ είμαι άντρας" . Hope that helped a bit.
"ένα" was just a typo. I was mainly wondering if "εγώ" could be omitted. Thanks for the correction and clarification.
After the verb “to be” in Greek, we have to use the nominative case?
655
Is ενας here the same word as the number one/1? Then - do the greeks conjugate all the words of number(δυο, τρία, τέσσερα, πεντα, εξη, etc)?
Is ενας here the same word as the number one/1?
Yes -- like in many languages that have an indefinite article, it's the same word as the number "one". (English is a bit unusual in having "an" and "one" split up into two words.)
do the greeks conjugate all the words of number(δυο, τρία, τέσσερα, πεντα, εξη, etc)?
No -- just 1, 3, 4.
And 3 and 4 only have two gender forms (neuter and uter -- masculine/feminine forms are the same): 3 = τρεις m/f, τρία n; 4 = τέσσερις m/f, τέσσερα n.
Those three numbers also have a distinct form in the genitive case (ενός m/n, μίας f; τριών; τεσσάρων).
δύο is the same for all three genders (unlike, say, Latin, where you have duo m/n but duae f) and all cases.
And πέντε, έξι and above are always invariable.
At least, until you get to the hundreds and thousands -- those vary by gender again, e.g. διακόσιοι άντρες, διακόσιες γυναίκες, διακόσια παιδία (200 men/women/children) or χίλιοι άντρες, χίλιες γυναίκες, χίλια παιδία (1000 men/women/children).
Isn't the indefinite article supposed to be in the accusative case?
No.
είμαι is not a transitive verb that takes a direct object.
Both "sides" (the subject and the predicate) are in the nominative case.
(Hint: one way to understand that it's not a transitive verb is by trying to put it into the passive voice -- which turns a direct object into a subject. But you can't turn "I am a man" into "A man is been by me" -- that makes no sense. That's a clue that "a man" is not a direct object and "be" is not a transitive verb "acting" on an object.)
235
Why two differences for I AM A MAN.. Εγώ είμαι ένας άντρας And Είμαι άντρας !? Ευχαριστώ