Polish edit

Etymology edit

From choć +‎ -by. First attested in 1549.[1] Compare Kashubian chòcbë, Masurian chocbi, and Silesian choćby.

Pronunciation edit

Conjunction edit

choćby

  1. (unreal conditional) even if
    Synonyms: choć, chociaż, chociażby, nawet gdyby
    Near-synonyms: jakkolwiek, żeby
  2. denotes a lack of preference with a choice; either … or

Declension edit

Particle edit

choćby

  1. if only
    Synonyms: choć, chociaż, chociażby, przynajmniej
    Synonym: bodaj
  2. for example, say
    Synonyms: bodaj, bodajby, chociażby, na przykład
  3. (Middle Polish) even (in reality; implying an extreme example in the case mentioned, as compared to the implied reality)
    Synonym: nawet

Related terms edit

conjunction
noun
verb

Trivia edit

According to Słownik frekwencyjny polszczyzny współczesnej (1990), choćby is one of the most used words in Polish, appearing 22 times in scientific texts, 9 times in news, 22 times in essays, 40 times in fiction, and 30 times in plays, each out of a corpus of 100,000 words, totaling 123 times, making it the 982nd most common word in a corpus of 500,000 words.[2]

References edit

  1. ^ Maria Renata Mayenowa, Stanisław Rospond, Witold Taszycki, Stefan Hrabec, Władysław Kuraszkiewicz (2010-2023) “choćby”, in Słownik Polszczyzny XVI Wieku [A Dictionary of 16th Century Polish]
  2. ^ Ida Kurcz (1990) “choćby”, in Słownik frekwencyjny polszczyzny współczesnej [Frequency dictionary of the Polish language]‎[1] (in Polish), volume 1, Kraków, Warszawa: Polska Akademia Nauk. Instytut Języka Polskiego, page 47

Further reading edit

Silesian edit

Etymology edit

From choć +‎ -by. Compare Polish choćby.

Pronunciation edit

Particle edit

choćby

  1. as if
    Synonyms: choby, jakby

Conjunction edit

choćby

  1. (unreal conditional) if
    Synonym: choby

Declension edit

Further reading edit

  • choćby in silling.org
  • Henryk Jaroszewicz (2022) “cho(ć)by”, in Zasady pisowni języka śląskiego (in Polish), Siedlce: Wydawnictwo Naukowe IKR[i]BL, page 68