2020-09-09

Italian - Plural

Basic rules

There’re a few rules to know how to construct plural in italian depending on the ending of the singular form. I’m probably missing some rule but in general we’ve got:

Table 1. basic rules
singular	plural	example
-a	-e	amica → amice (friend f.)
-o	-i	zaino → zaini (bagpack)
-e	-i	stazione → stazioni (station)

Here you have some examples following these rules:

Table 2. examples
singular	plural	meaning
ospedale	ospedali	hospital
cassa	casse	house/home
matita	matite	pencil
panino	panini	sandwich
penna	penne	pastry
pizza	pizze	pizza
piazza	piazze	square
povero	poveri	poor
quaderno	quaderni	notebook
sieda	siede	chair
spiaggia	spiaggie	beach

Foreign words

In general foreign words are the same in both singular and plural.

Adding h

Finally there’re some exceptions to the basic rules. These exceptions try to keep the sonority that the singular form had.

Table 3. h rules
singular	plural	example
-ca	-che	amica → amiche
-ga	-ghe	ruga → rughe

When ending with -go depends. If it’s related to a person the the plural ends with gi as in biologo → biologi:

Table 4. ending with -go
singular	plural	example
-go	-gui	albergo → alberghi
-go	-gi	biologo → biologi

The same goes with -co. Depending on whether the letter before co is a vowel or a consonant, the plural will be different.

Table 5. ending with -co (cont.)
singular	plural	example
-[vowel]co	chi	parco → parchi
-[conso]co	ci	medico → medici

Must-know exceptions

Finally there’re some must-know exceptions worth learning:

Table 6. important exceptions
singular	plural	meaning
uomo	uomini	man
dito	dita	finger
uovo	uova	egg
braccio	braccia	arm

Basic rules

Foreign words

Adding h

Must-know exceptions

Reference