The gender of nouns in Italian
Italian is a language that is very connected to genders: almost every noun we pronounce is classified as masculine or feminine and therefore, knowing the gender of a noun, is useful to conjugate its corresponding adjectives and articles (or vice versa). Ofc when it comes to nouns that indicate living beings it's easier: you see their gender or anyway you can understand/ask for it (especially with humans and animals). But what happens with all the others "things"?
Nature, animals' species, objects, body parts, materials, stuff in general...?
It is not always an easy task to tell if the noun of a "something", that is not a human/animal thing, is masculine or feminine. No matter what is its final vowel, most of the times you have to learn it by heart or remember through practice (cause many nouns got their gender out of a linguistic formality).
The thing to keep in mind is that (1) sometimes, a noun that is masculine at the singular, can become feminine at the plural (e.g. l'uovo, le uova / the egg, the eggs), and that (2) some nouns can totally change meaning according on their gender/last vowel (e.g. il porto = the harbour, la porta = the door). To make it worse, there are also some (3) fixed nouns in number (e.g. la serie, le serie / the serie, the series - fem.) and (4) nouns that don't have a final vowel (e.g. lo sport, gli sport / the sport, the sports - masc.).
Ending of the noun: -A, -O, -E (singular nouns) - general rules.
- Most of the times, if a singular noun ends in -a (plural -e: e.g. la matita, le matite / the pencil, the pencils) it means it is feminine, while if it ends in -o (plural -i: e.g. il libro, i libri / the book, the books), it is masculine.
But this is not always true.
- There are singular nouns ending in -o that are feminine (e.g. la mano, le mani / the hand, the hands) and names ending in -a that are masculine (e.g. il problema, i problemi / the problem, the problems).
- Same thing happens with the ending -e: we can have both a masculine noun (e.g. il piede, i piedi / the foot, the feet) or a feminine noun (e.g. la lince, le linci / the lynx, the lynxes - on a side note, this is the name of the specie. We don't have different nouns for masculine and feminine: in general, la lince = feminine, "l'esemplare maschio della lince / il maschio della lince" * = masculine. But I'll get back to this later on). There's the word "signore" which at the singular is masculine and at the plural is feminine (gentleman= il signore, gentlemen= i signori; lady= la signora, ladies= le signore)
- And all this said, there are also some common exceptions.
So what can we do? - Rules that can come in handy most of the times.
There are general rules that can work for most cases (not always, keep in mind): when you find the category in which the object (or whatever else) is into, you can try to follow them. Let's see:
-> Nouns that are more likely to be FEMININE:
1) Fruits names: e.g. la mela (apple), la pera (pear), la pesca (peach)...
2) Abstract things, sciences, disciplines: e.g. la geometria (geometry), la pace (peace), la grammatica (grammar)...
3) Military activities: e.g. la guardia (the guard), la pattuglia (the patrol)...
4) Some names of cities [esp. when talking about a specific time/era/characteristic or telling something about a city: because you leave the word "città", which is feminine, implied], regions [but not all the Italian regions], islands [mostly cause "isola" is a feminine noun and it is left implied when saying the island's name], states, continents: e.g. la Milano da bere (social life/aperitivo time in Milan), Venezia è bella (=la città di Venezia è bella / the city of Venice is beautiful), la Lombardia, la collina (=la regione collinare / the hills region), l'Elba (=l'isola d'Elba / the island of Elba), la Francia, L'Europa...
5) Some sports associations: e.g. la Juventus, la Fiorentina...
6) Almost all the names ending by -a: e.g. la casa (house), la palla (ball), la testa (head)...
7) Many names ending in -i: e.g. la sintassi (syntax)...
8) The nouns ending in -tà and -tù: e.g. la verità (truth), la virtù (goodness)...
-> Nouns that are more likely to be MASCULINE:
1) Some names of trees [esp. fruit trees]: e.g. il platano (sycamore), il pino (pine), il pesco (peach tree), il pero (pear tree)...
2) Metals and chemical elements: e.g. il piombo (lead), l'oro (gold), l'ossigeno (oxygen)...
3) Months [when talking about some characteristic/a specific month] and days of the week: e.g. un maggio piovoso (a rainy May), il venerdì (friday)...
4) Some seas, mountains, lakes, rivers [mostly because you leave the words "mare, monte, lago, fiume" implied, and they are all masculine]: e.g. il Mediterraneo (=il mar Mediterraneo / the Mediterranean sea), il Cervino (=il monte Cervino / Mount Cervin), il (lago) Maggiore, il (fiume) Po [but those ending by -a can be treated as feminine when the word "fiume" isn't explicit: la Bormida = il fiume Bormida]...
5) Some wines, prayers and all the cardinal points: e.g. il Barolo [here too, you live the masculine word "vino" implied - but still for example, there's la Bonarda, which is a feminine wine when you don't say "il vino Bonarda". If they end by -a, you can still act as if they're feminine nouns tbh], il Padre Nostro [but there's also the feminine l'Ave Maria, bc is related to a woman], il Sud (South)...
6) Most of the nouns ending in -o: e.g. l'uovo (egg), lo specchio (glass)...
7) Most of the foreign nouns that end with a consonat: e.g. il computer, lo sport...
8) Some names ending by -a [esp. those that have a Greek origin or are of scientific/technical use]: e.g. il dramma (drama - play), l'eritema (rash), il karma (karma)...
-> Nouns that can be 50/50:
1) These are especially among those that end with -e: il mare (masculine), la nave (the boat)...
You mentioned common exceptions though -
Yes I did. And these are what I was referring to (and I mentioned as "problems" before):
1) Some words are fixed: they keep the same form both if they are feminine or masculine, but articles and adjectives have to clarify the gender: luckily they're often related to humans and their jobs: e.g. il/la fisioterapista (physiotherapist), il/la giornalista (journalist), il/la cantante (singer)... OR animal [species esp.] names: as said before when talking about the lynx (la lince), we generally say explicitly if the sample we are considering is masculine or feminine by adding "masculine/feminine" near the specie's name (e.g. la femmina/il maschio della lince, la lince femmina/la lince maschio).
2) Some words change their gender when passing from mascuiline to feminine and vice versa (basically when changing their final vowel): e.g. il busto (bust, chest), la busta (envelop)... (I call them "weird plurals"**)
3) Some words have a double plural***, one masculine and one feminine, and they carry a different meaning.
E.g.: il labbro (lip, rim) -> i labbri (rims), le labbra (lips); il braccio (arm, branch) -> i bracci (branches, arms of thing e.g. crane), le braccia (arms as body part)...
4) Some words have one singular form, but two different plurals according on the gender they're referring to: e.g. l'atleta (athlete) - gli atleti (plu. masc.), le atlete (plu. fem.)
5) Some words change completely (or only partially their ending) according to the gender they are referring to (it's generally for some jobs or animals), so it’s easier to find out the feminine and the masculine:
e.g.
il professore (man professor) + la professoressa (woman professor),
il traduttore (man interpreter) + la traduttrice (woman interpreter),
la mucca (cow) + il toro (bull),
maschio (male) + femmina (female),
uomo (man) + donna (woman)
dio (god), dea (goddess)
fratello (brother), sorella (sister)...
To go a little more into detail: ****
What if we wanted to change the gender of a noun from masculine to feminine?
[This is gonna be esp. related to the last point of the previous slot, so the partially changing endings]:
- with most of the masculine nouns ending in -o, you only have to change that vowel with an -a: e.g. il gatto -> la gatta (cat), il cavallo -> la cavalla (horse)... [just beware it doesn't change the meaning of the word, as seen above]
- at times you add the suffix -essa:
e.g. professore -> professoressa (professor), poeta -> poetessa (poet), leone -> leonessa (lion/lioness), dottore -> dottoressa (doctor)...
- if the masculine ends in -tore, you add the suffix -trice (only exception: dottore):
e.g. traduttore -> traduttrice (translator), pattinatore -> pattinatrice (skater), giocatore -> giocatrice (player), attore -> attrice (actor/actress)...
- and then there are few nouns that at the feminine end with -ina:
e.g. gallo -> gallina (rooster/hen), re -> regina (king/queen), eroe -> eroina (hero/heroine), zar -> zarina (tsar/tsarina)...
I'm leaving some old links worth taking a look at. You can find more examples too.
OLD POST * | WEIRD PLURALS ** | MORE SAMPLES **** | A CURIOSITY | DOUBLE PLURALS ***
