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The
Croatian language (Croatian:
Hrvatski jezik)
is a
language of the western group of South
Slavic languages which is used primarily by the
Croats.
Croatian is a southern variant inside the
Slavic language family. Other languages in this group include
Serbian, Bosnian and Slovene (language spoken in Slovenia).
Croatian and Serbian used to be considered as one language
(sometimes called Croatian-Serbian or Serbo-Croatian) until recent
events in former Yugoslavia. Bosnian language was also classified
within the general “Serbo-Croatian” group.
From linguistic point of view, structurally and lexically all these
languages are actually so similar that can be describe as
dialectical variants of the one language.
Croatian
language is based on the Ijekavian pronunciation of
Štokavian dialect (with some influence from
Čakavian and
Kajkavian) and written with the
Croatian alphabet .
Pronunciation
The Croatian writing system is phonetically consistent: every letter
is pronounced and its sound will not vary from word to word.
Regarding to the position of stress, there is only one rule you have
to follow: the last syllable of the word is never stressed. In most
cases the accent falls on the first vowel in the word.
Croatian language uses a modified Roman alphabet (unlike Serbian, which uses
the Cyrillic alphabet). Many letters are pronounced like in English
– but the following below may cause misunderstanding.
|
Basic words: |
Croatian
is in red! |
-
Ć -
as the ‘tu’ in ‘future’
-
Č
– as the ‘ch’ in ‘chop’
-
C
- as the ‘ts’ in ‘cats’
-
đ
- as
the ‘du’ in ‘verdure
-
dž
- as the ‘j’ in ‘just’
-
j
- as the ‘y’ in ‘young’
-
lj
– as the ‘lli’ in ‘million’
-
š
– as the ‘sh’ in ‘ship’
-
ž
– as the ‘s’ in ‘pleasure’
|
| Hello |
Zdravo |
| Goodbye |
Doviđenja |
| Yes |
Da |
| No |
Ne |
| Please |
Molim |
| Thank you |
Puno hvala |
| You're welcome |
Nema na
Ćemu |
| Excuse me |
Oprostite
|
| Sorry (excuse me) |
Pardon (izvinite) |
| See you later |
Vidimo se kasnije |
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