27 Comments
Is the second verb necessary here? In English, this translates as "You are a boy, not a girl." If the second esti were removed, would the sentence still read correctly or naturally in Romanian?
Hello! I am Romanian. I want to tell you that without the second verb it's OK. The sentece would be correct. I hope you will learn very well my language. I am a fifth grade pupil and I like so much English!
275
Same reason we say "You are a boy, not a girl." and also "You are a boy, you are not a girl." - both mean the same thing, but are written slightly differently. Or conversely - why say "You're a boy, not a girl." instead of "You are a boy, not a girl." - it's basically just that language isn't usually rigid. It's like how you can use e instead of este - that's basically like saying "she's" or "he's" instead of "she is" or "he is". They boy have the same meaning at the end of the day, but one might be more "strictly" correct even though both are acceptable and understandable.
Also maybe to help you, it would be "I hope you will learn my language very well" and "I like English so much". Not judging though cause i learnt english since i was born and i bet since ur learning it that u haven't. Just some helpful tips
Yes, indeed, it is correct too in Romanian, as in English, without the second verb.
I never knew Romanian was part of the Romance language family. It's interesting to see comparisons here to many other Western European languages (Italian, French, Spanish, Portuguese) but also see similarities to Slavic languages. Unless I'm wrong, I imagine esti (sorry I can't do accents now) is similar to "jestes" in Polish?
Esti/este sounds more like latin origin if you ask me. Romanian: El este un om. Spanish: El es un hombre. French: Il est un homme. (He is a man)
It's very close to both origins it seems. spanish: tu estas, french: tu es, portuguese: tu es. But the 'e' at the beginning is pronounced like "ye", very similar to the slavic ones.
Seems to be quite common in Romanian that you pronounce some words that begins with an E with the Y-sound before. El = yel. Ea = ya. Ei = yey. Eu = yeu.
Edit: I did some research and the words themselves are of latin origin but the pronunciations of the j/y sounds were of slavic influence.
Yes, Romanian has a strong core of latin origin (with significant slavic grafts) but it is also a member of the "Balkan sprachbund" ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balkan_sprachbund ) where a lot of non related languages influenced each other.
You are right, and as far as I know approx. 10% of Romanian vocabulary is derived from slavic languages.
Does Romanian do the whole formality thing in other Romance languages like Spanish (tú vs usted vs ustedes)?
Yes it does. I can't remember it off the top of my head but it is similar to that.
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I don't know as is usually in the live daily, but second personal formal and informal is true:
Formal Dumneavoastră sunteți (ru)= usted es (Spnish), você é (portuguese), Lei é (Italian), vous est (french) = you are
Informal Tu esti (ru)= Tú eres (Spnish), tu és (portuguese), tu sei (Italian), tu es (french) = you are
My understamding is that Romanian is the closest language to latin that is still in use today
My girlfriend is romanian buy fluent in italian and a bit of Latin and says italian is the closest
The question didn't understand. It can easily be He is a boy and not a girl. However the answer is YOU are a boy??? Pls clarify. THank you
- 275
It says "Tu ești" not "El este/" or "El e" - that is what makes it second person (you are) rather than 3rd person (he is). Edit: Never mind, this is already answered. LOL
Is it Ok if I am learning Italian, Spanish and Romanian at the same time?
I gave you a lingo, Because you won the bingo. This language is just like latin, Go on, go up, go in
(I just hope that go up and go in don't mean anything.)
In reference to the question of which one of the Latin derived languages is closest to Latin, I agree that Italian is very close but in all fairness Romanian it is the only one that has kept the declension of names by adding a suffix depending on the logical analysis of the sentence. However has reduce the number of declension endings (cases) from 7 to 4 because dative and genitive are the same as well as nominative and accusative and doesn't have the ablative.
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Absolutely! On the nativlang website they actually compared the Romanian noun declensions to those of Vulgar Latin... the similarity was nothing less than mind-blowing
