potrafić

• potrefić (Middle Polish)

From po- + trafić.^[1][2] First attested in 1544.^[3] Compare Czech potrefit, Kashubian pòtrafic, Carpathian Rusyn потрафити (potrafyty), Silesian potrefić, Serbo-Croatian pòtrefiti / по̀трефити, and Slovak potrafiť.

• Audio:

  (file)

• Rhymes: -afit͡ɕ
• Syllabification: po‧tra‧fić

potrafić impf or pf (imperfective (obsolete or dialectal) potrafiać)^[4][5]

1. (intransitive, auxiliary) to know how, to be able to, can (to have enough skill, strength, means, or ability to do something) [with infinitive ‘to do what’]

   Synonym: umieć

2. (intransitive, auxiliary, of objects) to be able to, can (to be designed for something) [with infinitive ‘to do what’]
3. (intransitive, auxiliary) to be able to, can (to do something regularly, usually considered negative by the speaker) [with infinitive ‘to do what’]
4. (intransitive, auxiliary) to be able to, can (to go to certain limits in one's behavior or to reach a certain state) [with infinitive ‘to do what’]

potrafić pf

1. (transitive, obsolete) to capture likeness; to hit the mark (to draw or carve successfully)
2. (transitive, obsolete) to hit the mark (to succeed, to manage to do)

   Synonyms: dokazać, poradzić sobie, zaradzić

3. (transitive, Middle Polish) to meet, to come across, to find

   Synonyms: spotkać, natknąć się, znaleźć

4. (transitive, Middle Polish) to achieve, to get

   Synonyms: osiągnąć, uzyskać

5. (transitive, Middle Polish) to hit

   Synonyms: ugodzić, uderzyć

6. (transitive, Middle Polish) to happen to someone, to meet
7. (transitive, Middle Polish) to reach, to get somewhere

   Synonym: dostać się

8. (reflexive with się, Middle Polish) to occur, to happen, to ensue

   Synonyms: przydarzyć się, zdarzyć się, zaistnieć

   1. (reflexive with się, Middle Polish, of people) to appear, to show up

      Synonym: zjawić się

9. (reflexive with się, Middle Polish) to meet, to meet up, to meet each other

   Synonym: spotkać się

Complex future forms such as będzie potrafić/potrafił(a/o) are proscribed. Instead only the simple future potrafi or będzie umieć/umiał(a/o) are prescribed.

The active adjectival participle potrafiący is also proscribed, instead either a subordinate clause with który or umiejący are prescribed.

Imperfective:

Perfective:

According to Słownik frekwencyjny polszczyzny współczesnej (1990), potrafić is one of the most used words in Polish, appearing 21 times in scientific texts, 5 times in news, 17 times in essays, 32 times in fiction, and 36 times in plays, each out of a corpus of 100,000 words, totaling 111 times, making it the 553rd most common word in a corpus of 500,000 words.^[6]

• potrafić in Wielki słownik języka polskiego, Instytut Języka Polskiego PAN
• potrafić in Polish dictionaries at PWN
• Maria Renata Mayenowa; Stanisław Rospond; Witold Taszycki; Stefan Hrabec; Władysław Kuraszkiewicz (2010-2023), “potrafić się”, in Słownik Polszczyzny XVI Wieku [A Dictionary of 16th Century Polish]
• “POTRAFIĆ”, in Elektroniczny Słownik Języka Polskiego XVII i XVIII Wieku [Electronic Dictionary of the Polish Language of the XVII and XVIII Century], 14.01.2020
• Paweł Kupiszewski (14.01.2020), “POTRAFIĆ%20SIĘ”, in Elektroniczny Słownik Języka Polskiego XVII i XVIII Wieku [Electronic Dictionary of the Polish Language of the XVII and XVIII Century]
• Samuel Bogumił Linde (1807–1814), “potrafić”, in Słownik języka polskiego
• Aleksander Zdanowicz (1861), “potrafić”, in Słownik języka polskiego, Wilno 1861
• A. Kryński, W. Niedźwiedzki, editors (1908), “potrafić”, in Słownik języka polskiego (in Polish), volume 4, Warsaw, page 812
• potrafić in Narodowy Fotokorpus Języka Polskiego