Together vs apart
Lesson opening
This is the first part of the lesson. The rest, the exercises and the reviews are in the app.
Together or apart: sastavljeno i rastavljeno pisanje
Punctuation has lessons of its own (“Basic punctuation”, and next “Commas in clauses”). Here we take the other area of spelling where instinct misleads: writing words together or apart (sastavljeno i rastavljeno pisanje). Serbian writes similar combinations sometimes as one word (neću), sometimes with a space (ne znam), and sometimes with a hyphen (auto-put). This decides not only whether a text looks literate but sometimes what it means.
We will take the main knots one by one: ne with a verb and with an adjective, the words in ni-, the question particle li that always stands alone, the superlative prefix naj-, the future tense, prepositions and adverbs that grew together, and the hyphen. There are not many rules, and each one follows a clear logic.
ne with a verb: apart, with four exceptions
The general rule is simple: the negative ne “not” before a verb is written apart, with a space, just as English writes not as a word of its own. ne znam “I don’t know”, ne mogu “I can’t”, ne idem “I’m not going”, ne razumem “I don’t understand”. But four verb forms have grown together with ne into a single word. You met them in the lesson “Basic negation”:
Three of them are long-fused negatives of the commonest verbs: hteti “to want; will” (neću), imati “to have” (nemam) and biti “to be” (nisam); the fourth is the prohibitive nemoj “don’t”. Every person of them is joined too: nisi, nije, nismo, niste, nisu; nemaš, nema, nemamo, nemate, nemaju; nećeš, neće, nećemo, nećete; nemojte. Beside imati there is also a whole verb nemati “not to have”, joined in all its forms: Nemao sam vremena. “I didn’t have time.” Nothing else is fused: ne bih “I wouldn’t” (the lesson “Conditional I”) is two words, and every other verb takes its ne with a space.
Do not confuse the four with verbs whose ne- is part of the word itself: nedostajati “to be missing” (Nedostaješ mi. “I miss you”, literally “you are missing to me”), nestati “to disappear”. These are words in their own right, and a dictionary lists them under ne-.
ne with adjectives, nouns and adverbs: together
With nouns and adjectives (including participles used as adjectives) the negative ne behaves the other way round: it is written together and makes a new word with the opposite meaning. This is exactly what English does with its prefix un-: not known, but unknown.
The logic is this: with a verb, ne is a separate negating word, like English not; with a noun or adjective it becomes a prefix that creates a new word, like English un-, in-, im-, il- (poznat “known” → nepoznat “unknown”). Likewise: nemoguć “impossible”, nepismen “illiterate”, neveseo “cheerless, glum”, and adverbs: nerado “reluctantly”, nedavno “recently”.
Cheat sheet
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Together or apart
Three ways to write neighbouring parts: together (neću), apart (ne znam), with a hyphen (auto-put). Grammar decides, not sound.
ne + verb: apart; four exceptions together
All their persons are joined (nisi, nema, nećeš, nemojte…), and the verb nemati (nemao); nothing else. Separate words: nedostajati “to be missing”, nestati “to disappear”.
ne + adjective, noun or adverb: together (like un-)
Apart in a contrast: Ne danas, nego sutra. “Not today but tomorrow”; ne samo… nego i “not only… but also”.
Words in ni-: one word; three with a preposition
- niko, ništa, nigde, nikad, nikakav, nijedan: Niko ništa ne zna.
- ni od koga, ni sa kim (ni s kim), ni o čemu: not “sa nikim”.
- ni… ni, ni “not even”: apart (ni kafu ni čaj, ni dinara). “No, not a single”: nijedan; ni jedan appears in ni jedan ni drugi and for “not even one”.
The particle li: always apart
- da li (question) ≠ dali (they gave); je li (is it…?) ≠ jeli (they ate); radiš li. Casual jel': texting only.
The superlative naj-: always together
- najbolji, najlepši, najveći, najmlađi; never apart.
- Comparative starting with j: two j’s: najjači, najjužniji, najjednostavniji, najjeftiniji.
The future
-ti verb first: one word (radiću, biće); -ći: two (ići ću, doći ću); after another word: Sutra ću raditi, neću raditi. Not “raditi ću”; “radit ću” is Croatian.