Thread: прошла или прошли

They have spent their life here.
Звесь прошла /прошли их жизнь.

Прошла.

Здесь.

Originally Posted by Оля

Прошла.

Здесь.

Sorry Оля, can you explain a little? I don't understand the part on здесь and прошла yet. Thanks.

"Their life". It's singular. That's why прошла (singular).
If it was "their lifes" (их жизни) - then it would be прошли (plural).

The correct spelling is здесь, not звесь as you wrote.

Originally Posted by Оля

"Their life". It's singular. That's why прошла (singular).
If it was "their lifes" (их жизни) - then it would be прошли (plural).

The correct spelling is здесь, not звесь as you wrote.

Thanks for the clarification. I've just noted my misspelling for здесь.
So for the plural form:
They have spent their lives here.
Здесь прошли их жизни.
Please correct my mistakes.

Originally Posted by tohca

So for the plural form:
They have spent their lives here.
Здесь прошли их жизни.
Please correct my mistakes.

Your variant "Здесь прошла их жизнь" was fine. Just if you use жизнь in plural (in some contexts) it'll be a verb in plural too.

Example of using жизни (in plural): "Война забрала их молодые жизни" (although the subject here is война so no any verb in plural).

Originally Posted by tohca

They have spent their life here.

I would translate the above sentence in two possible ways:

1. Здесь прошла их жизнь.

2. Здесь они прожили свою жизнь.

The word "жизнь" is singular for the original sentence hints that they lived their lives together.

Personally, I would not recommend the plural form as in:

3. Здесь они прожили свои жизни.

because it sounds bogus in Russian. I guess the rationale behind that would stem from the difference of usage of the word "life:"

(1) life = time period

(2) the life = a physiological process of existence of proteins, carbohydrates, etc.

The former usage would mostly be singular and the latter can also be plural as in the good example Оля provided earlier:

"Война забрала их молодые жизни."

Большое спасибо.

how about Они провели всю свою жизнь здесь, в Урюпинске.

Здесь они прожили свои жизни

wouldn't this mean that each person had lived more than one life?

Originally Posted by John_Douglas

Здесь они прожили свои жизни

wouldn't this mean that each person had lived more than one life?

No. Each person lived his own life.

However the assumption that you made is reasonable when we read science fiction, for example.

Originally Posted by chaika

how about Они провели всю свою жизнь здесь, в Урюпинске.

Sounds good to me. A little bit far from the English original though.