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își

to himself/herself/itself/themselves (unstressed reflexive dative pronoun) /ˈɨʃʲ/

other#346 most common

Also: his/her/its/their own (marks possession reflected back onto the subject), for himself/herself/themselves

Example sentences

El își spală mâinile.
He washes his (own) hands.
Copiii își fac temele în fiecare seară.
The children do their homework every evening.
Ea își amintește de copilărie.
She remembers her childhood.
Fiecare om își asumă riscuri diferite în viață.
Every person takes on different risks in life.
Președintele și-a asumat responsabilitatea pentru decizie.
The president took responsibility for the decision.
Ei își imaginaseră, înainte de a pleca, un viitor cu totul diferit.
They had imagined, before leaving, a completely different future.

Word family

sereflexive pronoun, accusative case
sinehimself/herself/itself, stressed formînsușihimself (emphatic, 'his very self')
a-și amintito remember (literally 'to remind oneself')
a-și imaginato imagine

Etymology

Își is the unstressed dative form of the Romanian reflexive pronoun, used with third-person subjects, singular or plural. It comes from Latin sibi, the dative of the reflexive pronoun se. Romanian added a prosthetic vowel î- before the inherited si- sequence, the same pattern seen in îmi (from mihi) and îți (from tibi).

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