Noun: zaķis
Hyphenation:
Gender: Masculine
Declension:
Singular
| Nominative | zaķis |
| Accusative | zaķi |
| Genitive | zaķa |
| Dative | zaķim |
| Instrumental | zaķi |
| Locative | zaķī |
| Vocative | zaķi |
Plural
| Nominative | zaķi |
| Accusative | zaķus |
| Genitive | zaķu |
| Dative | zaķiem |
| Instrumental | zaķiem |
| Locative | zaķos |
| Vocative | zaķi |
Sample Sentences
-
pelēkais, baltais zaķis (gray, white hare)
-
bailīgs kā zaķis (timid as a hare)
-
nobijies kā zaķis (scared as a hare)
-
Lieldienu zaķis (Easter Bunny)
-
braukt par zaķi (to ride as a hare)
-
“zaķiem” būs jāmaksā 40 latu sods (hares will have to pay a fine of 40 lats)
Nouns inflected like zaķis
sarķis,
skuķis,
ķauķis,
septembris,
bumbieris,
trijstūris,
pulveris,
zeņķis,
mūziķis,
pareģis,
dziedzeris,
smiltsērkšķis,
fonētiķis,
gaisakuģis,
rūķītis,
pērtiķis,
sliņķis,
gramatiķis,
finieris,
āzenis, etc. (List truncated at 20 nouns)
Etymology
The origin of this word is unclear. Traditionally, it is explained as a borrowing from Belarusian dialectal за́йка (zájka), reshaped under the influence of kaķis (“cat”), but the similar Sudovian cognate makes this explanation dubious. It is difficult also to make it compatible with the Lithuanian and Slavic cognates. For the Slavic terms, there are various opinions, generally leading up to the Proto-Indo-European stem *ǵʰey- (“to drive, to exhort, to move quickly”). It is possible that the root of all those forms may be some pre-Indo-European word (*ǵa-, *ǵay-, *ǵuy-) to which Indo-European suffixes were attached. Cognates include Lithuanian dialectal zui̇̃kis, Sudovian zags, Old Church Slavonic заѩць (zajęcĭ), Russian, Belarusian за́яц (zájac), Ukrainian за́єць (zájecʹ), Czech zajíc, Polish zając. See: Czech Nouns '
zajíc', Polish Nouns '
zając'.
Translations