Lesson 1. Oylar, fasllar, sana: months, dates, and ordinal numbers

A year has twelve months (oy) and four seasons (fasl) — see the table. Uzbek writes all of them with a small letter, unlike English: yanvar, bahor. A capital is used only at the start of a sentence. The months look like the English ones but are spelled the Uzbek way: aprel, iyun, iyul, yanvar, noyabr. sentabr and oktabr have no y. Dictionaries also have sentyabr, oktyabr: that answer counts, and the key shows sentabr, oktabr. “When?” is the familiar -da ending after the word: mayda — in May, yozda — in summer, qishda — in winter. Words with two meanings: oy is “month” and “moon”; yoz is “summer”, and also “write!” (from yozmoq). Common mistakes: • NOT “da may” → mayda: the ending goes after the word, there is no preposition before it. • NOT “Yanvar” with a capital in the middle of a sentence → yanvar.

An ordinal number answers nechanchi? — “which one in order?”. After a vowel it is -nchi: ikki → ikkinchi, yigirma → yigirmanchi. After a consonant, -inchi: bir → birinchi, toʻrt → toʻrtinchi. In a compound number only the last word takes the ending: oʻn birinchi. A date is an ordinal number and the month: the day comes first, unlike English “May 5”. You ask about the date with nechanchi and sana. In figures, the date and the year take a hyphen — 11-oktabr, 2026-yil — and are read as ordinals. Answers in words and in figures both count. “In the year …” is yilda. For the year you were born there is a set phrase: Men … yilda tugʻilganman — “I was born in …”. Learn it as a whole: we'll take tugʻilganman apart later. A birthday is tugʻilgan kun: tugʻilgan kunim — “my birthday”. Common mistakes: • NOT “ikkiinchi” → ikkinchi • NOT “toʻrtnchi” → toʻrtinchi • NOT “oʻninchi birinchi” → oʻn birinchi