Learn how to use adjectives in Italian
To learn how to use adjectives in Italian, it’s important to not follow rules as they are in English.
First of all you should remember that adjectives nearly always follow the noun that they are describing, e.g. una casa vecchia (”a house old”) not una vecchia casa (an old house).
Secondly, adjectives have to ‘agree’ with the noun. That means, for example, that if the noun is feminine and plural, the adjective must be feminine and plural too, e.g. ‘una casa vecchia‘ (one old house), or ‘due case vecchie’ (two old houses).
Let’s use the example of bello (beautiful):
Singular masculine endings are usually -o (eg bello), plural masculine are usually -i (eg belli).
Singular feminine endings are usually -a (eg bella), plural feminine endings are usually -e (eg belle).
Some adjectives only have singular and plural endings, for example inglese / inglesi (English), and don’t change for masculine or feminine. Eg, un uomo inglese (an English man), una donna inglese (an English woman).
Click here for an exercise to practice these rules.
Please note that some adjectives also precede the nouns they are modifying for emphasis or contrast, e,g bello, grande, brutto, santo, cattivo, piccolo etc…Una grande casa, una bella casa, un brutto affare. Some of these change according to the number and gender of the noun they precede, e,g una bella donna, un bel ragazzo, un bell’uomo..
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