Greetings in Polish: dzień dobry, cześć, do widzenia, pan and pani

Dzień dobry and dobry wieczór: saying hello in Polish

Dzień dobry is literally good day, and it covers what English splits into good morning and good afternoon. Polish has no separate everyday greeting for the morning, so the same two words greet a neighbour at seven and a shop assistant at three. It is neutral in register and suits a stranger, a teacher or a colleague alike.

When the evening comes, dobry wieczór takes over, again with the plain meaning good evening. Dobranoc, good night, is a farewell for the night, not a greeting, and Wiktionary notes that the word is two words fused into one, dobra and noc. Its relatives dobrej nocy and the clipped branoc mean the same.

Two details of pronunciation matter. In dzień dobry the dz is a single soft sound, and the y of dobry is the central vowel written ɘ in the IPA. In wieczór the ó is pronounced exactly like u, so the word sounds like vyeh-choor. The table above gives the full transcriptions.

Ty, pan and pani: formal and informal greetings in Polish

Polish has a formal way of saying you that works differently from French vous or German Sie. The informal ty is used with friends, family and children. With anyone else the speaker uses pan for a man and pani for a woman, and the verb goes into the third person, as if talking about the person: czy pan ma czas?, have you got time?, literally does the gentleman have time. For a group, panowie, panie or, for men and women together, państwo do the same job.

The Wikipedia article on honorifics traces this system to the nobility: pan once meant lord. Today it carries no rank, only distance. The choice decides which greetings in Polish are possible: a pan or a pani is greeted with dzień dobry and leaves with do widzenia, while cześć belongs to people already on first-name terms.

The same split runs through the courtesies. Miło mi cię poznać, nice to meet you, uses cię, the ty form; to someone addressed formally it becomes miło mi pana poznać or miło mi panią poznać.

Cześć, hej and siema: informal greetings

Cześć is the friendly word for both meeting and leaving. It comes from Old Polish cześć, honour, and Wiktionary records three pronunciations in use, from the full /ˈt͡ʂɛɕt͡ɕ/ to shortened forms without the final consonant. Wiktionary limits it to people the speaker addresses by first name or knows informally, so a shopkeeper or a professor addressed as pan or pani gets dzień dobry instead.

Hej, from the attention call hey, is a colloquial alternative. Siema is younger still and marked as slang. It is a clipping of jak się masz, how are you, worn down to its last two words and then to one, the way English turned how do you do into howdy. Elo is another slang greeting listed beside it.

Witam, I welcome, sits at the other end. It is used to greet people the speaker does not know, and a company or a hotel says witamy, we welcome. In e-mails it is a common opening line, though Wiktionary notes that this use is sometimes proscribed.

Do widzenia, na razie and other goodbyes

Do widzenia means until seeing, the same idea as French au revoir, and it is the formal goodbye for shops, offices and anyone addressed as pan or pani. Do zobaczenia, until the next seeing, is its informal partner and promises a meeting.

Na razie is the everyday casual farewell. As an adverb it means for now, and as a goodbye it means see you, with the clipped nara and the short pa as even more casual forms. Cześć works as a goodbye among friends as well, so a conversation between them can open and close with the same word.

Dziękuję and proszę: the two most useful words

Dziękuję is the first person of dziękować, to thank: literally I thank. It suits every register, and bardzo, very much, can follow it. Proszę is the busiest word in the language. Wiktionary lists nine senses for it, among them please, you're welcome in reply to thanks, here you are when handing something over, come in, and pardon? when asking someone to repeat.

On the telephone Polish speakers answer with halo or słucham, I'm listening, and proszę can do the same job. A learner who knows dzień dobry, dziękuję, proszę and do widzenia can already get through a shop, a ticket office and a café.