pakao

Serbo-Croatian

Etymology

Inherited from Proto-Slavic *pьkъlъ, from Proto-Indo-European *pik- (“pitch”). Cognate with Bulgarian пъкъл (pǎkǎl), Slovene pekel, Slovak peklo, Ukrainian пекло (peklo), German Pech. Akin to Latin pix (“pitch, tar”). The meaning "hell" is a semantic loan from Old Polish piekło, which arose under the Christian influence (sinners are submerged in boiling tar in hell).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /pǎkao/
• Hyphenation: pa‧ka‧o

Noun

pàkao m (Cyrillic spelling па̀као)

1. hell

   Dobro došli u pakao, gospodo. ― Welcome to hell, gentlemen.

Declension

Declension of pakao

	singular	plural
nominative	pàkao	pakli
genitive	pakla	pakálā
dative	paklu	paklima
accusative	pakao	pakle
vocative	pakle	pakli
locative	paklu	paklima
instrumental	paklom	paklima

Further reading

• “pakao”, in Hrvatski jezični portal [Croatian language portal] (in Serbo-Croatian), 2006–2025