"a" is the indefinite article in English and it is used with nouns to specify that we are talking about a non-specific or general noun:
a dog
a cat
a boy
a girl
a cat
a boy
a girl
Italian nouns have a gender (either masculine or feminine)
and Italian articles do too…
The masculine indefinite article in Italian is UN:
un libro
a book
un ragazzo
a boy
un giorno
a day
un occhio
an eye
~
una cosa
a thing
una ragazza
a girl
una casa
a house
una birra
a beer
MASCULINE or FEMININE?
In general, nouns that end in "o" are masculine, and nouns that end in "a" are feminine, but there are some exceptions that must be memorized as well as nouns that end in -e, -à and others. When learning a new noun, I recommend learning it with the article, so that the association of the noun with its gender becomes automatic.
~
an apple
an orange
an ear
an eye
This "n" has a function— it makes pronunciation easier.
Similary, in Italian, the masculine and feminine articles vary a bit based on the starting sound of the following word:
Masculine nouns that start with Z, S+consonant, PS and GN take UNO:
uno zaino
a backpack
uno sport
a sport
uno psicologo
a psychiatrist
uno gnocco
a dumpling
UN-> UNO
Italian adds the vowel "o" to break up these difficult consonant clusters that would be hard to pronounce together.
With feminine nouns that begin with these consonants, you don't have to do anything special because UNA already has a vowel:
Italian adds the vowel "o" to break up these difficult consonant clusters that would be hard to pronounce together.
With feminine nouns that begin with these consonants, you don't have to do anything special because UNA already has a vowel:
una zia
an aunt
una sposa
a bride
~
For feminine nouns, UNA becomes shortened to UN' (with an apostrophe) and attached if the following word starts with a vowel:
un'amica
a friend (that's a girl)
un'aranciata
an orange soda
UNA-> UN'
This rule can be easily remembered if you practice saying the words aloud. If you say: una amica✗ you have to say the "a" sound twice— it glides along much better to just have one "a" sound: un'amica✓ so that's how you pronounce it and write it.
The masculine form UN doesn't have an extra vowel sound at the end, so you don't need to do anything special with words that begin with vowels:
This rule can be easily remembered if you practice saying the words aloud. If you say: una amica✗ you have to say the "a" sound twice— it glides along much better to just have one "a" sound: un'amica✓ so that's how you pronounce it and write it.
The masculine form UN doesn't have an extra vowel sound at the end, so you don't need to do anything special with words that begin with vowels:
un amico
a friend (that's a boy)
un anniversario
un anniversario
an anniversary
That's it! Capito? (got it?)
Reinforce what you've learned with the Italian Basics digital workbook: (with easily printable pages!)
Ready for the next lesson in this series?
Potrebbe pure interessarti….
The Beginner's Italian Grammar Series, starting with:
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