A pronoun is a word that replaces a noun or a noun phrase. For example:

Desi went to Plovdiv. She called me on arrival.

There are two pronouns in the second sentence: she and me. “She” is the subject as it represents the person or thing doing the action. “Me” represents the object, or the person on the receiving end of the action. I’ll cover object pronouns in a separate post as they’re a little more complicated in Bulgarian.

Back to subject pronouns. You’ll notice in the table below that “you” is included twice, once for singular / familiar and once for plural / polite. This is clearly different to how we use “you” in English, although that wasn’t always the case. Back in the day, we used “thee” for singular / familiar and “you” for plural / polite. While we dropped the “thee”, Bulgarian maintained both forms. You’ll need to learn them.

Personal subject pronouns

You should use ти with friends, friends of friends, or in informal settings. When you’re out and about, ordering coffee, or asking someone in the street for directions, you should use Вие. You’ll notice in the table above when using Вие as the polite form in writing, the first letter is capitalised. When it’s used as a plural, it’s written in lowercase.