Western Slavic Greetings - Review
If you’ve looked at “Hello and Goodbye” and “Western Slavic Greetings” you’re ready for this page. If not, go look at them first.
Now that you’ve seen a little bit about the greetings, let’s put a few things together.
The first thing you have to focus on is that while these languages are different, there’s a lot that holds them together. Compare the following expressions, focusing not on difference in meaning but on similarities between phrases. I’m giving very rough phonetics here to highlight similarities; the phrases with proper spellings follow.
Cz. doe-bray rah-no / Slk. doe-bray rah-no
Pol. jen doe-bree / Cz. doe-bree den / Slk. doe-bree dyen
Pol. doe-bray vyechoor / Cz. doe-bray veh-chair / Slk. doe-bray veh-chair
Pol. doe-bra nots / Cz. doe-bro nots / Slk. doe-brew nots
Pol. doe vee-dze-nya / Slk. doe vee-deh-nya
You can see connections. Here they are officially spelled:
Cz. dobré ráno / Slk. dobré ráno
Pol. dzień dobry / Cz. dobrý den / Slk. dobrý deň
Pol. dobry wieczór / Cz. dobrý večer / Slk. dobrý večer
Pol. dobranoc / Cz. dobrou noc / Slk. dobrú noc
Pol. Do widzenia / Slk. Do videnia
So far, of course, you’ve seen the expressions together, but might have had to look back to remind yourself which is which. Let’s put the greetings together one more time, but in a new way that helps you relate them to each other instead of thinking of them as individual versions of English phrases:
| Pol. | Cz. | Slk. |
|---|---|---|
| dzień dobry | dobré ráno | dobré ráno |
| " | dobrý den | dobrý deň |
| " | dobré odpoledne | " |
| dobry wieczór | " | " |
| " | dobrý večer | dobrý večer |
| dobranoc | dobrou noc | dobrú noc |
Looking at this table, you can see how the greetings transition from one to the next and that in some cases, like the Pol. Dobry wieczór, what's at issue is not a difference in meaning but in when one goes, in effect, from saying "Good day" to "Good evening."
Now that some connections have been made and you've looked at the greetings from a couple different angles, test your learning by finishing the table below. Fill in all the blanks, repeating expressions as necessary.
| Pol. | Cz. | Slk. |
|---|---|---|
| dzień dobry | - | dobré ráno |
| - | dobrý den | |
| - | dobré odpolodne | - |
| dobry wieczór | - | dobrý deň |
| - | dobrý večer | - |
| dobranoc | - | dobrú noc |
Check your answers against the tables above.
Finally, remind yourself of Pol. Do widzenia and Slk. Do videnia and the unrelated, hence tricky, Cz. Na shledanou
