накрыть на стол
“накрыть на стол” (nakryt na stol) — to set the table in Russian. Phrase, level A2. Pomogi nakryt na stol k prikhodu gostey — "help set the table for the guests' arrival" — to lay the cloth and set the plates; nakryt is to cover from above: the table under the cloth as a house under a roof. In a live sentence: “Помоги накрыть на стол к приходу гостей” — Help set the table for the guests' arrival.
In short
| Written in Russian | накрыть на стол |
| Read in Latin letters | nakryt na stol |
| Translation | to set the table |
| Part of speech | phrase |
| Level | A2 |
Why it looks that way
Pomogi nakryt na stol k prikhodu gostey — "help set the table for the guests' arrival" — to lay the cloth and set the plates; nakryt is to cover from above: the table under the cloth as a house under a roof.
A word with a story stays in memory longer than one learned as a “spelling — translation” pair: memory holds on to meaning, not to a string.
In a live sentence
A single word almost never appears alone in conversation. A sentence shows where it fits and what stands next to it.
- Помоги накрыть на стол к приходу гостейPomogi nakryt na stol k prikhodu gosteyHelp set the table for the guests' arrival
How not to forget this word
Reading a word and remembering it are different jobs. A day later, little survives of a single reading — and that is not bad memory, that is how memory works.
- This has been tested on foreign words too. The difference shows up most when you test yourself a few days later rather than straight away.checked many timesKim & Webb, 2022, Language Learning 72(2) · 48 experiments, 3,411 participants, 98 comparisons.
- Recalling beats re-reading. Covering the translation and trying to remember it does more than reading it ten more times.checked many timesAdesope, Trevisan & Sundararajan, 2017, Review of Educational Research 87(3) · 188 experiments, 272 comparisons. g = 0.61; against plain re-reading 0.51, against passive review 0.93.
- An answer you worked out yourself sticks better than one handed to you.checked many timesBertsch et al., 2007, Memory & Cognition 35(2) · 86 studies, 445 comparisons, d = 0.40.
Frequently asked
How do you say “to set the table” in Russian?
«накрыть на стол», read “nakryt na stol”. In a live sentence: “Помоги накрыть на стол к приходу гостей” — Help set the table for the guests' arrival. Phrase, level A2; written with the characters н, а, к, р, ы, т, ь, н, а, с, т, о…
How is “накрыть на стол” written in Latin letters?
nakryt na stol. This is a practical spelling — you need it to read aloud and be understood, not to meet an academic standard.
Why does this word look the way it does?
Pomogi nakryt na stol k prikhodu gostey — "help set the table for the guests' arrival" — to lay the cloth and set the plates; nakryt is to cover from above: the table under the cloth as a house under a roof. A word with a story stays in memory longer than a “spelling — translation” pair: memory holds on to meaning, not to a string.