Nesprávnym

Nesprávnym is the instrumental singular form of the Slovak adjective nesprávny, meaning "wrong" or "incorrect." It is used to describe masculine or neuter nouns in the instrumental case, for example after verbs or prepositions that govern the instrumental.

In Slovak, adjectives decline to agree with the noun they modify. The instrumental singular endings are -ým for masculine and neuter nouns, which is why nesprávnym is used in these contexts. For feminine nouns, the instrumental singular form would be nesprávnou.

Examples of usage include: "Išli sme nesprávnym smerom." (We went in the wrong direction.) and "Nesprávnym rozhodnutím sme si urobili škodu." (We caused damage with the wrong decision.) These illustrate how nesprávnym functions to describe actions or directions that are incorrect or misguided within a sentence.

Etymology and related forms: Nesprávnym derives from nesprávny, with the prefix ne- signaling negation of správny, meaning "correct." The opposite form in the instrumental masculine or neuter is nesprávnym, while the feminine instrumental is nesprávnou. Common synonyms in Slovak include chybný or nesprávny in more general terms, though nesprávny often carries a stronger sense of normative incorrectness.

In other languages of the West Slavic family, similar forms appear, such as Czech nesprávným, reflecting shared grammatical patterns for the instrumental case of adjectives meaning "wrong" or "incorrect."