Thread: A small question about много

Hello

Each and every document I read about the Russian grammer suggests that the word "много" takes the genative case. Is that because the word "много" it self is the genetive form of the adjective "многий" ?

Is it possible to write "многие машины" to mean "many cars" . What does "многая машина"mean. The usage "многий" must be very limited our maybe just with plural forms of the verbs ? Could you give some examples of it's usage?

Thank you.

No. The word много is an adverb. Adverbs do not decline in Russian. The adverb много governs the genitive.
The word многий is an adjective and it declines. It agrees with a noun in case.
You can not say ‘многая машина’ because this adjective is used in plural only. So you can say:
1) много машин
2) многие машины

The variant (1) can be used only as a subject or a direct object in the sentence. In the former case the verb can be used either in neuter singular or (sometimes) in plural form.
По дороге едет(or едут) много машин. (subject)
Я вижу много машин. (object)

The variant (2) can be used in any case (but only in plural):
Многие машины так и не были проданы. (nominative)
У многих машин передние колёса являются ведущими. (genitive)
По многим машинам мы уже нашли информацию. (dative)
На многие машины установлена система навигации. (accusative)
Со многими машинами случилось то же самое. (instrumentalis)
Во многих машинах нет кондиционера. (locative)

"Много" is not a genitive form of adjective "многий" — these words are different parts of speech with the same root.
"Многий" is used only in plural form, "многие". It means "many" (or, to be precise, "many of"):
Многие машины в России — с правым рулем. Many (of) cars in Russia are RHD vehicles.

DAMN! I came the the second — again!

1) много машин
2) многие машины

какая разница?

Originally Posted by Valda

1) много машин
2) многие машины
какая разница?

Now this is a problem indeed. Let's try.

много машин - there are some cars and they are many. That's it. Just many (or "a lot of").
многие машины - this phrase always implies that there are other cars beside mentioned. It is "a big part of the whole" rather than just "many". Often it is used like "многие машины из тех, что были угнаны позавчера" that is "many of".

So.

По улице ехало много машин. - It is about the street, that contains some cars.
Многие машины ехали по улице. - It is about cars you were talking before. Many of them were moving along the street.

Though sometimes this difference is slight and expressions can be interchanged... but sometimes no.

Originally Posted by impulse

Each and every document I read about the Russian grammer suggests that the word "много" takes the genative case.

Yes, it's right. It is as if you said "many of something".
In English, you say: "Hundreds of cars", "A lot of cars", "Lots of cars", "Plenty of cars"...
In Russian we say the same way. In addition, we also say "Five of cars", "Ten of cars" etc.
Complare: сотни машин, много машин, множество машин, пять машин, десять машин etc.

Originally Posted by impulse

Is that because the word "много" it self is the genetive form of the adjective "многий"?

No, it is not. "Много" is not a genitive form. And it is not even an adjective. It is more like an adverb, and "много" is unchangeable.
The genitive form of "многий" would be "многого".

Originally Posted by impulse

Is it possible to write "многая машина" to mean "many cars"?

No, it is impossible. "Многий" requires any countable noun to be in plural. "Многие машины" is possible.

However, there is a subtle difference between "много машин" and "многие машины". They are not interchangeable.
"Много машин" is just "a lot of cars": На улице много машин.
"Многие машины" is "many of the cars (but not all of them)". Compare:

На улице много машин. Многие машины совсем новые. - There are lots of cars in the street. Many of them are quite new.

PS Actually, you can say "многие из + GEN" or just "многие". It means the same. The following versions are interchangeable:
Многие из машин совсем новые.
Многие машины совсем новые.
Многие из них совсем новые.
Многие совсем новые. (If it is clear the conversation was about cars).

I understand thanks. So it does not have an adjective form?

Много is an adverb.
Многий is an adjective.
There is a slight difference in their meaning as explained above.

Sometimes (but not always) they are interchangeable:

Он посетил много стран. - He visited a lot of countries.
Он посетил многие страны. - He visited many of the countries.

Originally Posted by Боб Уайтман

...Он посетил много стран. - He visited a lot of countries.
Он посетил многие страны. - He visited many of the countries.

Is there another one, for "He visited (much)/(a lot) of the country" Он посетил много страны. ?? Or is that one многое? Он посетил многое страны.

Originally Posted by Seraph

Is there another one, for "He visited (much)/(a lot) of the country" Он посетил много страны. ?? Or is that one многое? Он посетил многое страны.

он много где был в стране
он много куда ездил по стране

I understand that but there must be a reason why Много takes genetive case. This adverb must be the genetive form of a word. Maybe it has the nominative, the accusative, dative etc equivalents? Like in English (if I am not mistaken) "lot" means "many of something". So it is used as "a lot of cars". My point is "a lot of" in English has a reason for the way it is used so Много must also have a reason.

Originally Posted by impulse

I understand that but there must be a reason why Много takes genetive case.

I do not understand your concern. When learning another language, I would like to know "How is an expression constructed?" and not "Why is it so?".
To answer "why?" you have to go deep into the history of the language. Native speakers are usually unable to answer "why?", all what they can do for you is to show "how".

But actually I do not mind discussing "why's" for the reason of curiosity. However, it does not affect language learning.

Originally Posted by impulse

This adverb must be the genetive form of a word. Maybe it has the nominative, the accusative, dative etc equivalents?

Adverbs are unchangeable. The concept of case is not applicable to them! What you are asking here is a sort of grammar nonsense (don't take it personally).

Originally Posted by impulse

Like in English (if I am not mistaken) "lot" means "many of something". So it is used as "a lot of cars". My point is "a lot of" in English has a reason for the way it is used so Много must also have a reason.

I do not understand why you provide the example of "many of something" and you're still surprised that Russian works the same way with its "много + Genetive Plural"? You should not be surprized then.

If you say, "пять столов" (five tables), does it surprize you?
The same is if you say "количество столов" (a quantity of tables), множество столов (plenty of tables), сколько столов? (how many tables) etc. - quantities are expressed using the genitive (QUANTITY of SOMETHING in plural).
Много is just the same word as any of the listed above: много столов.

BTW, it is English which is illogical, cause sometimes it uses "of" and sometimes it skips it:
dozens of books, hundreds of books, thousands of books, a lot of books, a great number of books, quantity of books, but
five books, ten books, a hundred books, many books, how many books.

I would prefer using "of" everytime And that exactly corresponds the Russian genitive.

Originally Posted by impulse

I understand that but there must be a reason why Много takes genetive case. This adverb must be the genetive form of a word. Maybe it has the nominative, the accusative, dative etc equivalents? Like in English (if I am not mistaken) "lot" means "many of something". So it is used as "a lot of cars". My point is "a lot of" in English has a reason for the way it is used so Много must also have a reason.

I must correct some of the previous answers.

много is an adverb only when used with verbs. For example "много работать" - to work much.
When много is used with a noun it is a cardinal numeral (at list my vocabulary says so) and follows the rule that cardinal numerals (with some exceptions) require genitive after them.

As for intuitive reason... just get used to the language and you will find the reason. It works only that way. As well as in English.

PS
Несколько столов (a few tables, several tables); мало столов (few tables, insufficient amount of tables); достаточно столов (enough (of) tables); куча столов (lit.: a pile of tables - a great number of tables) - I hope you can see the pattern now.

Originally Posted by Боб Уайтман

I do not understand your concern. When learning another language, I would like to know "How is an expression constructed?" and not "Why is it so?".
To answer "why?" you have to go deep into the history of the language. Native speakers are usually unable to answer "why?", all what they can do for you is to show "how".
But actually I do not mind discussing "why's" for the reason of curiosity. However, it does not affect language learning. .

From my point of view, it affects the language learning because if someone understands the specific reason about why a word is used the way it is he/she can remember it much more easily and can attain a deep knowladge about the grammer rapidly. So that is why i am digging into whys. Hows are also important but it means to memorize not to understand.

Originally Posted by Боб Уайтман

Adverbs are unchangeable. The concept of case is not applicable to them! What you are asking here is a sort of grammar nonsense (don't take it personally). .

It is infact not a grammar nonsense. What I tried to ask was, if i am not some adverbs are formed up from adjectives. For example хороший – хорошо, трудный – трудно. I do not know if all adverbs are like this but thought that Много would also be formed up from an adjective.

Originally Posted by Боб Уайтман

I do not understand why you provide the example of "many of something" and you're still surprised that Russian works the same way with its "много + Genetive Plural"? You should not be surprized then. .

I provide the example because it makes the reason why it is used that why so that it is easy to spread that knowladge rapidly to the other areas of the grammer. Language is a logical thing. Each and everything must have a reason and form my point of view is improtant about ones learning curve.

Originally Posted by impulse

Language is a logical thing

That is true for constructed languages like Lojban or Esperanto, but for natural languages?
In Russian language there are more exceptions from rules than rules themselves!

Originally Posted by Inego

That is true for constructed languages like Lojban or Esperanto, but for natural languages?
In Russian language there are more exceptions from rules than rules themselves!

But from my point of view, just becuase Russian have more expectations when compared with other languages (and I do not think so those expectations are about the main grammatical structures, I think they are more about how the plurals are formed and how the verbs are declined etc) one must not learn the rules and whys of it.

For example, in Russian you count years like this: Один год, два года, три года, четыре года, пять лет, шесть лет.
I doubt that knowing WHY another word is used for plural of "год" above four (and not for all of them, because 21 - 24, 31 - 34 and so on will be "год(а)" again) — although an explanation exists — will help you to master Russian faster or more efficiently than just accepting those damned exceptions as they are.

Originally Posted by Inego

For example, in Russian you count years like this: Один год, два года, три года, четыре года, пять лет, шесть лет.
I doubt that knowing WHY another word is used for plural of "год" above four (and not for all of them, because 21 - 24, 31 - 34 and so on will be "год(а)" again) — although an explanation exists — will help you to master Russian faster or more efficiently than just accepting those damned exceptions as they are.

Why?

Originally Posted by impulse

Why?

In old Russian (maybe, 11th century or alike) nouns had 3 grammar numbers: Singular, Dual and Plural. And yes, that was the way all the Indo-European languages developed. The dual number was lost in most of the languages by merging with plural, however it still exists in a few of them (Scottish Gaelic, Slovenian, Sorbian and Frisian: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dual_(grammatical_number)).

The traces of the dual form are still found in Russian: рукав (a sleeve) has an unusual form of plural: рукава (instead of the expected рукавы, which does not exist). The same is with глаз (eye): глаза (and not глазы). The same is with ухо (ear): уши (and not уха, as it should be expected for the neutral gender). There are some other similar examples.
The explanation is that all those forms (рукава, глаза, уши) which are now considered as plurals, used to be the dual forms (old Russian: рукав (1) - рукава (2), рукавы (>2), the latter was rarely used since sleeves usually come in pairs, the same with eyes, ears...).
But the old Russian had separate dual and plural forms for every countable noun.

That is why, the number "два" (2) was originally used with the dual form: два года (two years), два города (2 towns), два моста (2 bridges).
So, what's wrong with "три", "четыре"? They are not dual, they should require plural. Yes! But the language sometimes changes obeying "the rule of analogy". People started using 3 and 4 the same way as 2. And that usage has become generally accepted.

But then Russian lost its dual number. However, the nominative dual form just occasionally was very similar to the genitive singular. People continued saying "два года, три года, четыре года", but this form was re-interpreted as the genitive singular. Because people forgot it was dual.

And what's with 5, 6 and greater? Those words (пять, шесть, ...) were originally nouns, not numerals. Therefeore, they required Plural Genitive (the same way as you say "a lot OF cars", "hundreds OF cars"). So, we say "пять городов, пять мостов, шесть городов, шесть мостов".

As to "год", I think someone else can explain why "годов" was replaced by "лет". I do not know an explanation for this word.

Due to some reason, people started counting "summers" instead of "years". By its origin, "лет" is genitive plural of "лето" (summer).