Lesson 15– Accusative (The Fourth) Case

         The rice is being soaked, French onion soup is ready, tofu is being marinated, and croutons are waiting to be put on the pan. Now I've got nothing to do so I decided to tell you something about the accusative case.

          The accusative case is a milestone when it comes to learning Czech. Most objects are in the accusative case so you'll be able to say almost any sentence you like, e. g. I hate you, I want this, Clean up your bedroom, Plug the headphones in, Turn the TV on, etc.

         This case (as well as the nominative, genitive [only when expressing somebody's possession, otherwise with prepositions], dative, vocative) usually doesn't need prepositions. If you'd use any preposition (s, bez, o, nad, pod, ...) except for pro (for) na (on, but only when you describe the movement of something being put/ thrown/spilled... on something), then there's definitely not the accusative case and you'd have to choose the appropriate case according to the preposition. 

        Then it's pretty easy to decide, which one is the right one. In the Lesson 12 I mentioned the situation in which you have to use the nominative case. If it's not one of them, then it might be the accusative case. The genitive is only used without a preposition when expressing somebody's possession (e. g. This car is John's.) The dative is also easily distinguished because you describe the "direction" in some way (e. g. This belongs to you. She wanted to give this to you.) In other words, if you'd use "to" in English, it's the dative case. And the vocative is only used when you address or call someone (e. g. Lucy, come here!) 

        The nouns' suffixes for the accusative case are in the tables listed in the section "Czech Language Course".

        I've prepared (= now, off the top of my head I'm going to show you) some example sentences for you (which case would be used in this sentence?):

Abyste se mohla zúčastnit, musíte poslat přihlášku. = To be able to participate you need to send an application.

Chtěl bych nějakou knihu. = I'd like some book.

Nenávidím tě. = I hate you.

Mám ráda slaná jídla. = I like salty foods. 

Sedni si na židli. = Sit on a chair.

Koupili to pro tebe. = They bought it for you. 

Osmažit krutony. = To fry croutons.

Marinovat tofu. = To marinate tofu.

Simple as that.

love & peace 

Ciray