Welcome to our lesson on Polish grammar. Today we'll learn about Biernik, which is the Accusative case in Polish. The Biernik case is primarily used for direct objects of transitive verbs. It answers the questions 'kogo?' meaning 'whom?' or 'co?' meaning 'what?'. For example, in the sentence 'Widzę kota' which means 'I see a cat', the word 'kota' is in the Biernik case because it's the direct object of the verb 'widzę'.
Let's look at how masculine nouns change in the Biernik case. For masculine animate nouns, which refer to living beings, the Biernik form is the same as the Genitive case, often ending in -a. For example, 'student' becomes 'studenta' in the sentence 'Widzę studenta' meaning 'I see a student'. For masculine inanimate nouns, which refer to non-living objects, the Biernik form is the same as the Nominative case, with no change in ending. For example, 'dom' remains 'dom' in the sentence 'Widzę dom' meaning 'I see a house'.
Now let's examine feminine nouns in the Biernik case. For feminine nouns ending in -a, which is very common in Polish, the -a changes to -ę in the Biernik case. For example, 'książka' meaning 'book' becomes 'książkę' in the sentence 'Czytam książkę' meaning 'I read a book'. For feminine nouns ending in a consonant, there is no change between the Nominative and Biernik forms. For example, 'noc' meaning 'night' remains 'noc' in the sentence 'Lubię noc' meaning 'I like the night'.