Deklinacyjny

Deklinacyjny is an adjective in Polish used to describe aspects related to declension (inflection) in linguistics. Declension is the system by which words change form to express grammatical categories such as case, number, and gender. Therefore, deklinacyjny denotes anything pertaining to this process, including inflectional forms, endings, and paradigms.

In linguistic descriptions, the term is applied to nouns, adjectives, pronouns, and numerals that undergo inflection. Phrases such as forma deklinacyjna (an inflectional form) or końcówka deklinacyjna (an inflectional ending) illustrate the kinds of features referred to as deklinacyjne. The concept also appears in discussions of declension classes, or klasa deklinacyjna, which groups stems by their shared inflection patterns. In Polish grammar, words are declined across cases (for example, seven cases in singular and plural) and must agree in gender, number, and case.

The term is used to distinguish inflectional properties from derivational processes, which create new words rather than modify them for grammatical function. In broader linguistic contexts, the equivalent English term is inflectional or related to inflection.

Etymologically, deklinacyjny comes from deklinacja (declension) via Latin roots, reflecting the long-standing study of word forms in many languages. The concept is central to understanding how languages encode grammatical relationships in the morphology of nouns, adjectives, pronouns, and numerals.