🦉📚 ARTICLES: Types, Functions, and Examples. Grammatical Analysis - Grammar, Italian ✍🏻
DOWNLOAD THE SUMMARY TABLES HERE:
👉🏻 https://pasticciotti.it/scarica/56
Articles are variable parts of speech that usually precede the noun and specify its gender (masculine or feminine) and number (singular or plural).
There are three types of articles with different functions.
DETERMINAL ARTICLES
The definite articles are il, lo, la (for the singular) and i, gli, le (for the plural).
The masculine singular definite articles are IL, come il gufo, which in the plural becomes I gufi, and LO, come lo struzzo, which in the plural becomes gli struzzi.
The feminine singular definite article, on the other hand, is LA, come la cicogna, which in the plural becomes le cicogne.
Be careful because LO and LA, when introducing a noun that begins with a vowel, lose their vowel and replace it with an apostrophe.
Thus, lo airone becomes l'airone, which in the plural is gli aironi.
And la oca becomes l'oca, which in the plural is le oche.
Remember that the article LO is used:
before masculine nouns that begin with a Z, such as lo zio or lo zaino;
before nouns that begin with:
S + consonant, such as lo squalo, lo scudo, lo stormo, or lo sparo;
N, PN, and PS, such as lo gnomo, lo pneumatici, lo psicologo;
X and Y, such as lo xilofono and lo yogurt.
INDETERMINATIVE ARTICLES
Then there are the indefinite articles, which are un, uno, una, and un'.
Un and uno are masculine, such as un gufo and un ostezzo.
Remember that UNO is used before the same nouns that require the definite article LO.
The feminine indefinite articles are una and un', such as una cicogna and un oca.
Pay attention to this very important rule: un’ appears exclusively before feminine nouns that begin with a vowel, such as un'oca, un'ape, un'allodola, and un'upupa. Conversely, masculine nouns that begin with a vowel always have a un (WITHOUT an apostrophe!), such as un usignolo, un orso, unelefante, and un herone.
At this point, you may have wondered: what are the plural indefinite articles? The answer is that indefinite articles DO NOT have a plural, so they must use partitive articles.
Thus, the plural of un gufo is dei gufi,
the plural of un osterich is degli struzzi,
the plural of una cicogna is delle cicogne,
and the plural of un'oca is delle oche.
PARTITIVE ARTICLES
Finally, there are the partitive articles: DEL, DELLO, and DELLA for the singular, and DEI DEGLI and DELLE for the plural.
In the singular, they precede uncountable nouns and indicate "a little bit of."
The masculine singular partitive articles are DEL and DELLO, such as del pane (bread) and dello zucchero (sugar).
The feminine singular partitive article is DELLA (jam), for example, della marmellata (marmalade).
In the plural, however, as we have already seen, partitive articles are used to form the plural of indefinite articles and indicate "some."
The masculine plural partitive articles are DEI and DEGLI, such as dei gufi (owl) or degli orsi (bears), while the feminine plural partitive article is DELLE (cedar), such as delle geese (oce) or delle cicogne (storks).
🎂🍰 Follow us on Facebook too! / pasticciotti.it and on Instagram: i_pasticciotti_it