Italian grammar: Adjectives of quality

Adjectives of quality (Aggettivi qualificativi) - Agreement

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Adjectives of quality (Aggettivi qualificativi) in Italian, serve to better describe the noun to which they relate by adding to its meaning, for example, a color, a shape, a nationality, etc...

Example: Una casa bianca (a white house), una vino italiano (an Italian wine), un'auto nuova (a new car), un cane grande (a big dog), etc...

Italian adjectives agree in gender and number with the noun they refer to. This rule is pretty easy to put into practice when the adjective describes only one noun, but, sometimes, it can describe more than one noun and, often, of different genders.

Let's see the three hypoteses:

1. If all nouns are masculine → the adjective is masculine
2. If all nouns are feminine → the adjective is feminine
3. If there is combination of masculine and feminine nouns → the adjective is masculine

All the adjectives are listed in dictionaries in the masculine singular form, but feminine and plurals can be obtained by changing the ending, in accordance with the following rules:

1. Adjectives ending in "-o"

These adjectives, which are the majority, have 4 different endings. Let's see how the adjective "nuovo" (new) behaves in all cases:

	Masculine	Feminine
Singular	nuov-o	nuov-a
Plural	nuov-i	nuov-e

Examples:

	Masculine	Feminine
Singular	Un libro nuovo (a new book)	Una donna alta (a tall woman)
Plural	Dei fogli gialli (Some yellow sheets)	Delle rose rosse (some red roses)

2. Adjectives ending in "-sta"

These adjectives have 3 different endings. Let's see how the adjective "egoista" (selfish) behaves in all cases:

	Masculine	Feminine
Singular	egoista	egoista
Plural	egoisti	egoiste

Examples:

	Masculine	Feminine
Singular	Un uomo egoista (a selfish man)	Una bimba entusiasta (an excited girl)
Plural	Dei ragazzi ottimisti (Some optimist guys)	Delle signore pessimiste (some pessimistic ladies)

3. Adjectives ending in "-e"

These adjectives have 2 different endings. Let's see how the adjective "inglese" (English) behaves in all cases:

	Masculine	Feminine
Singular	ingles-e	ingles-e
Plural	ingles-i	ingles-i

Examples:

	Masculine	Feminine
Singular	Un signore inglese (an English man)	Una sciarpa verde (a green scarf)
Plural	Dei cani grandi (Some big dogs)	Delle signore gentili (some nice ladies)

But...

Adjectives ending in "-one" have the feminine forms in "-ona" (sing.) and "-one" (plur.).

Example: una ragazza pasticciona (a bungling girl)

4. Invariable Adjectives:

There is only a few number of invariable adjectives:

"Pari" (equal) and its derivatives: "impari" (unequal) and "dispari" (odd)
The colors "rosa" (pink), "blu" (blue), "viola" (violet / purple) and "marrone" (brown)
Some new compound adjectives formed by "anti-" + noun, such as "antiurto"(shockproof), "antiruggine" (anti-rust), "antifurto" (anti-theft), etc...
The adverbial expressions used as adjectives "perbene" (respectable), "dabbene" (honest) and "dappoco" (insignificant)

5. Other adjectives that follow the same rules of nouns:

Adjectives ending in "-co" and "-go": click here
Adjective ending in "-io" and the feminine forms ending in "-cia" and "gia": click here

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