Romanian grammar
Encyclopedia
Standard Romanian
(i.e. the Daco-Romanian
language within Eastern Romance
) shares largely the same grammar
and most of the vocabulary and phonological processes
with the other three surviving varieties of Eastern Romance, viz. Aromanian
, Megleno-Romanian
, and Istro-Romanian
.
As a Romance language
, Romanian shares many characteristics with its more distant relatives: Italian
, French
, Spanish
, etc. However, Romanian has preserved certain features of Latin
grammar that have been lost elsewhere. That could be explained by a host of arguments such as: relative isolation in the Balkans, possible pre-existence of identical grammatical structures in the Dacian
, or other substratum (as opposed to the Germanic and Celtic substrata that the other Romance languages developed in contact with), and existence of similar elements in the neighboring languages. One Latin element that has survived in Romanian while having disappeared from other Romance languages is the morphological case
differentiation in nouns, albeit reduced to only three forms (nominative/accusative, genitive/dative, and vocative) from the original six or seven. Another might be the retention of the neuter gender
in nouns, although in synchronic terms, Romanian neuter nouns can also be analysed as "ambigeneric", i.e. as being masculine in the singular and feminine in the plural (see below) and even in diachronic
terms certain linguists have argued that this pattern was in a sense "re-invented" rather than a "direct" continuation of the Latin neuter.
Romanian is attested from the 16th century. The first Romanian grammar was Elementa linguae daco-romanae sive valachicae by
Samuil Micu and Gheorghe Șincai, published in 1780.
Many modern writings on Romanian grammar, in particular most of those published by the Romanian Academy
(Academia Română), are prescriptive; the rules regarding plural formation, verb conjugation, word spelling and meanings, etc. are revised periodically to include new tendencies in the language.
s are categorized into three genders
, masculine, feminine, and neuter, which however behaves like the masculine in the singular and the feminine in the plural, so that it is unclear whether it stems from the Latin
neuter. Nouns which in their dictionary form (singular
, nominative
, with no article
) end in a consonant
or in vowel
/semivowel
u are mostly masculine or neuter; if they end in ă or a they are usually feminine. In the plural
, ending i corresponds generally to masculine nouns, whereas feminine and neuter nouns often end in e. As there are many exceptions to these rules, each noun has to be learned together with its gender.
Examples:
For nouns designating people and animals the grammatical gender can only be masculine or feminine, and is strictly determined by the biological sex, no matter the phonetics of the noun. For example nouns like tată (father) and popă (priest) are masculine as they refer to male people, although phonetically they are similar to a large category of feminine nouns.
For native speakers the general rule for determining a noun's gender relies on the "one-two" test, which consists in inflecting the noun to both the singular and the plural, together with the numbers
one and two. Depending on the gender, the numbers will have different forms for each of the three genders, as illustrated below.
Note: Romanian numbers
generally have a single form regardless of the gender of the determined noun. Exceptions are the numbers un/o (one) doi/două (two) and all the numbers made up of two or more digits when the last digit is 1 or 2; these have masculine and feminine forms. Unlike languages such as Russian
, in Romanian there is no neutral form for numbers, adjectives or other noun determiners.
: singular and plural
. Morphologically the plural form is built by adding specific endings to the singular form. For example, nominative nouns without the definite article form the plural by adding one of the endings -i, -uri, -e, or -le. The plural formation mechanism, often involving other changes in the word structure, is an intrinsic property of each noun and has to be learned together with it.
Examples:
: nominative, genitive, dative, accusative, and vocative. Morphologically the nominative and the accusative are identical; similarly the genitive and the dative share the same form. The vocative is less used as it is normally restricted to nouns designating people or things which can be addressed directly; additionally, nouns in the vocative often borrow the nominative form even when there is a distinct vocative form available.
The genitive-dative form can be derived from the nominative. If the noun is determined by an indefinite article then the genitive-dative mark is applied to the article, not to the noun, for example un băiat - unui băiat (a boy - of/to a boy); for feminine nouns the form used in the singular is most often identical to the plural, for example o carte - unei cărți - două cărți (a book - of/to a book - two books). Similarly, if the noun is determined by the definite article (enclitic in Romanian, see that section), the genitive-dative mark is added at the end of the noun together with the article, for example băiatul - băiatului (the boy - of/to the boy), cartea - cărții (the book - of/to the book). Masculine proper names designating people form the genitive-dative by placing the article lui before the noun: lui Brâncuși (of/to Brancusi); the same applies to feminine names only when they don't have a typically feminine ending: lui Carmen.
In usual genitival phrases such as numele trandafirului (the name of the rose), the genitive is only recognized by the specific ending (-lui in this example) and no other words are necessary. However, in other situations, usually if the noun modified by the genitive attribute is indefinite, the genitival article is required, as for example in câteva opere ale scriitorului (some of the writer's works).
Romanian dative phrases exhibit clitic doubling
similar to that in Spanish
, in which the noun in the dative is doubled by a pronoun. The position of this pronoun in the sentence depends on the mood
and tense
of the verb
. For example, in the sentence Le dau un cadou părinților (I give a present to [my] parents), the pronoun le doubles the noun părinților without bringing any additional information.
As specified above, the vocative case in Romanian has a special form for most nouns, but for convenience reasons the form of the nominative is often employed. The traditional vocative is retained in speech, however, in informal speech, or by people living in the countryside. It is seen as a mark of unrefined speech by the majority of city-dwellers, who refrain from its usage. The forms of the vocative are as follows. (Note that the vocative does not have both definite and indefinite forms, as it is not used with any specific function within sentences. The following rules are to be applied for the indefinite form of the nouns):
s are attached to the end of the noun as enclitics (as in Bulgarian, Macedonian, Albanian, and North Germanic languages
) instead of in front. These enclitic definite articles are believed to have been formed, as in other Romance languages, from Latin demonstrative pronouns. The table below shows the generally accepted etymology
of the Romanian definite article.
Examples:
Nouns in the vocative case cannot be determined by an indefinite article.
Examples of indefinite article usage:
is determined by an adjective
, the normal word order is noun + adjective, and the article (definite or indefinite) is appended to the noun. However, the word order adjective + noun is also possible (and mostly used for emphasis on the adjective), in which pattern the article and any case marker that may be present is applied to the adjective instead. Examples follow.
"), somewhat similar to the English preposition of, for example in a map of China. In Romanian this becomes o hartă a Chinei, where "a" is the genitival article. The table below shows how the genitival articles depend on gender and number.
The genitival article also has genitive/dative forms, which are used only with a possessive pronoun. They are: alui (m. sg.), alei (f. sg.), and alor (pl., both genders). These forms are rarely used—especially the singular ones—and the sentences are usually rephrased to avoid them.
)
The number of different forms an adjective takes only in the singular are called endings, terminații. Similarly, the number of different forms an adjective takes in both the singular and the plural are called flexionary forms, forme flexionare. The adjective frumos (beautiful) has 2 endings, and 4 flexionary forms. (see above table)
The adjective verde (green) on the other hand, has 1 ending and 2 flexionary forms.
The foreign borrowed adjective oranj (orange) is called invariable, as it has only 1 ending, and 1 flexionary form. Adjectives that do not have only 1 flexionary form (and thus 1 ending) are called variable.
, depending on their usage in the phrase.
The pronouns above are those in the nominative case
. They are usually omitted in Romanian unless required to disambiguate the meaning of a sentence. Usually, the verb ending provides information about the subject. The feminine forms of plural pronouns are only used for groups of persons of items of exclusively female gender. If the group contains elements of both genders, the masculine form is used. Pronouns in the vocative case
in Romanian, which is used for exclamations, or summoning, also take the forms of the nominative case.
forms of the pronouns come in two forms: a stressed and an unstressed form:
The stressed form of the pronoun is used (in phrases that are not inverted
) after the verb, while the unstressed form is employed before the verb. Romanian requires both forms of a pronoun to be present in a sentence, if a relative clause
is employed, which also reverses the order of the forms (stressed before unstressed). Otherwise, the stressed form is usually left out, the only exception being its usage for adding emphasis to the pronoun.
forms of the pronouns:
forms of the pronouns (also called possessive pronouns, pronume posesive):
Notice particularly the retention of the genitive inflection in the third person: the pronoun, like Latin eius, eorum, inflects according to the possessor, not the possessed.
The above reflexive pronouns are in the accusative and dative cases, and in both stressed / unstressed forms. As is made clear, the reflexive pronouns are identical to the personal pronouns, with the exception of the 3rd person, which has entirely new forms. The genitival forms of the reflexive pronouns are the same for the 1st and 2nd persons, but also differ in the 3rd person singular, which is al său. This is a direct continuation of Latin usage; Latin suus was used only when the possessor was the subject of the sentence.
The polite pronouns were derived from old Romanian phrases used for addressing the sovereign
, such as Domnia Ta, Domnia Voastră, Domnia Lui ("Your Majesty", "Your Majesty (plural)", "His Majesty", literally "Your Reign", etc.). By means of vowel elision, domnia became shortened to dumnea.
The polite pronouns all have the same forms in all cases (the only exception being dumneata, with the genitive/dative form of dumitale), and they exist only in the second and third person, due to them not being used to refer to oneself:
The second person singular denotes a level of politeness that is between that of tu and that of dumneavoastră. However, it is considered by some to be of the same degree of politeness as tu. It is generally found in conversation where old people are involved, as its use is slowly deprecating in favour of dumneavoastră.
s because of the many similar-sounding forms. The forms in parentheses are the corresponding personal pronouns:
s to their main clause, whereas interrogative pronouns are used to form questions. The interrogative pronouns are usually written out with a question mark
after them, to differentiate them from their relative counterparts.
The most common relative/interrogative pronouns are
The most common indefinite pronouns are:
The most common negative pronouns are:
s are considered to form a distinct part of speech, called numeral (plural: numerale). Examples:
, Romanian verb
s are highly inflected according to person, number, tense, mood, voice. The usual word order in sentences is SVO (Subject - Verb - Object). Romanian verbs are categorized into four large conjugation groups depending on the ending in the infinitive mood. The actual conjugation patterns for each group are multiple.
s usually determine verbs (but could also modify a clause or an entire sentence) by adding a qualitative description to the action. Romanian adverbs are invariant and are identical in shape (being both homophone
s and homograph
s) to the corresponding adjective in its masculine singular form. A remarkable counterexample for this is the adjective-adverb pair bun-bine ("good" (masculine singular) - "well").
Some examples are
No prepositions take nouns in the nominative case.
s. It is also noteworthy that Romanian terminology for the terms simple sentence
, complex sentence
, and phrase
is somewhat counterintuitive. The Romanian term propoziție means as much as simple sentence (or clause). To describe a complex sentence (or compound sentence
), Romanian uses the word frază, which can cause confusion with the English word phrase, which describes not a complex sentence, but a grouping of words. In consequence, Romanian doesn't have terms for the English noun phrase
, or verb phrase
, preferring the more commonly understood term predicate for the latter. The former has no formal equivalent in Romanian.
Simple sentences can be of two types: main clauses and subordinate clauses
Example:
Even though this sentence is long, it is still composed of a single simple sentence, which is a main clause.
Example:
There are also subordinate clauses other than the relative clause, which is an attributive clause, since it determines a noun, pronoun or numeral, and not a verb phrase. Here is a list of examples illustrating some of the remaining cases:
Direct Object Clause (propoziție subordonată completivă directă):I understand 1/ what the teacher is saying. 2/
Indirect Object Clause (propoziție subordonată completivă indirectă):I am thinking 1/ at what the teacher is saying. 2/
Subject
Clause (propoziție subordonată subiectivă):What the teacher is saying, 1/ is true. 2/
Local Circumstantial Object Clause (propoziție subordonată completivă circumstanțială de loc):
are called coordinating because they do not define the type of clause introduced. Rather, they coordinate an existing clause with another, making the new clause of the same type as the other one. The coordinating conjunctions are of four types (note that the list is not exhaustive):
An example of two main clauses (1, 2) linked together by a coordinative conjunction (bold) is:
Two subordinate clauses (2, 3) can also be joined to the same end:
The same effect of two main clauses (1, 2) being tied together can also be achieved via juxtaposition of the sentences using a comma:
Romanian language
Romanian Romanian Romanian (or Daco-Romanian; obsolete spellings Rumanian, Roumanian; self-designation: română, limba română ("the Romanian language") or românește (lit. "in Romanian") is a Romance language spoken by around 24 to 28 million people, primarily in Romania and Moldova...
(i.e. the Daco-Romanian
Daco-Romanian
Daco-Romanian is the term used to identify the Romanian language in contexts where distinction needs to be made between the various Eastern Romance languages...
language within Eastern Romance
Eastern Romance languages
The Eastern Romance languages in their narrow conception, sometimes known as the Vlach languages, are a group of Romance languages that developed in Southeastern Europe from the local eastern variant of Vulgar Latin. Some classifications include the Italo-Dalmatian languages; when Italian is...
) shares largely the same grammar
Grammar
In linguistics, grammar is the set of structural rules that govern the composition of clauses, phrases, and words in any given natural language. The term refers also to the study of such rules, and this field includes morphology, syntax, and phonology, often complemented by phonetics, semantics,...
and most of the vocabulary and phonological processes
Romanian phonology
This article discusses the phonology of the Romanian language. For other details on this language the reader is referred to that article....
with the other three surviving varieties of Eastern Romance, viz. Aromanian
Aromanian language
Aromanian , also known as Macedo-Romanian, Arumanian or Vlach is an Eastern Romance language spoken in Southeastern Europe...
, Megleno-Romanian
Megleno-Romanian language
Megleno-Romanian is a Romance language, similar to Aromanian and Romanian, or a dialect of the Romanian language...
, and Istro-Romanian
Istro-Romanian language
Istro-Romanian is an Eastern Romance language that is still spoken today in a few villages and hamlets in the peninsula of Istria, on the northern part of the Adriatic Sea, in what is now Croatia as well as in other countries around the world where the Istro-Romanian people settled after the two...
.
As a Romance language
Romance languages
The Romance languages are a branch of the Indo-European language family, more precisely of the Italic languages subfamily, comprising all the languages that descend from Vulgar Latin, the language of ancient Rome...
, Romanian shares many characteristics with its more distant relatives: Italian
Italian language
Italian is a Romance language spoken mainly in Europe: Italy, Switzerland, San Marino, Vatican City, by minorities in Malta, Monaco, Croatia, Slovenia, France, Libya, Eritrea, and Somalia, and by immigrant communities in the Americas and Australia...
, French
French language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
, Spanish
Spanish language
Spanish , also known as Castilian , is a Romance language in the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several languages and dialects in central-northern Iberia around the 9th century and gradually spread with the expansion of the Kingdom of Castile into central and southern Iberia during the...
, etc. However, Romanian has preserved certain features of Latin
Latin
Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...
grammar that have been lost elsewhere. That could be explained by a host of arguments such as: relative isolation in the Balkans, possible pre-existence of identical grammatical structures in the Dacian
Dacian language
The extinct Dacian language may have developed from proto-Indo-European in the Carpathian region around 2,500 BC and probably died out by AD 600. In the 1st century AD, it was the predominant language of the ancient regions of Dacia and Moesia and, possibly, of some surrounding regions.It belonged...
, or other substratum (as opposed to the Germanic and Celtic substrata that the other Romance languages developed in contact with), and existence of similar elements in the neighboring languages. One Latin element that has survived in Romanian while having disappeared from other Romance languages is the morphological case
Declension
In linguistics, declension is the inflection of nouns, pronouns, adjectives, and articles to indicate number , case , and gender...
differentiation in nouns, albeit reduced to only three forms (nominative/accusative, genitive/dative, and vocative) from the original six or seven. Another might be the retention of the neuter gender
Grammatical gender
Grammatical gender is defined linguistically as a system of classes of nouns which trigger specific types of inflections in associated words, such as adjectives, verbs and others. For a system of noun classes to be a gender system, every noun must belong to one of the classes and there should be...
in nouns, although in synchronic terms, Romanian neuter nouns can also be analysed as "ambigeneric", i.e. as being masculine in the singular and feminine in the plural (see below) and even in diachronic
Diachronic
Diachronic or Diachronous,from the Greek word Διαχρονικός , is a term for something happening over time. It is used in several fields of research.*Diachronic linguistics : see Historical linguistics...
terms certain linguists have argued that this pattern was in a sense "re-invented" rather than a "direct" continuation of the Latin neuter.
Romanian is attested from the 16th century. The first Romanian grammar was Elementa linguae daco-romanae sive valachicae by
Samuil Micu and Gheorghe Șincai, published in 1780.
Many modern writings on Romanian grammar, in particular most of those published by the Romanian Academy
Romanian Academy
The Romanian Academy is a cultural forum founded in Bucharest, Romania, in 1866. It covers the scientific, artistic and literary domains. The academy has 181 acting members who are elected for life....
(Academia Română), are prescriptive; the rules regarding plural formation, verb conjugation, word spelling and meanings, etc. are revised periodically to include new tendencies in the language.
Gender
Romanian nounNoun
In linguistics, a noun is a member of a large, open lexical category whose members can occur as the main word in the subject of a clause, the object of a verb, or the object of a preposition .Lexical categories are defined in terms of how their members combine with other kinds of...
s are categorized into three genders
Grammatical gender
Grammatical gender is defined linguistically as a system of classes of nouns which trigger specific types of inflections in associated words, such as adjectives, verbs and others. For a system of noun classes to be a gender system, every noun must belong to one of the classes and there should be...
, masculine, feminine, and neuter, which however behaves like the masculine in the singular and the feminine in the plural, so that it is unclear whether it stems from the Latin
Latin
Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...
neuter. Nouns which in their dictionary form (singular
Grammatical number
In linguistics, grammatical number is a grammatical category of nouns, pronouns, and adjective and verb agreement that expresses count distinctions ....
, nominative
Nominative case
The nominative case is one of the grammatical cases of a noun or other part of speech, which generally marks the subject of a verb or the predicate noun or predicate adjective, as opposed to its object or other verb arguments...
, with no article
Article (grammar)
An article is a word that combines with a noun to indicate the type of reference being made by the noun. Articles specify the grammatical definiteness of the noun, in some languages extending to volume or numerical scope. The articles in the English language are the and a/an, and some...
) end in a consonant
Consonant
In articulatory phonetics, a consonant is a speech sound that is articulated with complete or partial closure of the vocal tract. Examples are , pronounced with the lips; , pronounced with the front of the tongue; , pronounced with the back of the tongue; , pronounced in the throat; and ,...
or in vowel
Vowel
In phonetics, a vowel is a sound in spoken language, such as English ah! or oh! , pronounced with an open vocal tract so that there is no build-up of air pressure at any point above the glottis. This contrasts with consonants, such as English sh! , where there is a constriction or closure at some...
/semivowel
Semivowel
In phonetics and phonology, a semivowel is a sound, such as English or , that is phonetically similar to a vowel sound but functions as the syllable boundary rather than as the nucleus of a syllable.-Classification:...
u are mostly masculine or neuter; if they end in ă or a they are usually feminine. In the plural
Plural
In linguistics, plurality or [a] plural is a concept of quantity representing a value of more-than-one. Typically applied to nouns, a plural word or marker is used to distinguish a value other than the default quantity of a noun, which is typically one...
, ending i corresponds generally to masculine nouns, whereas feminine and neuter nouns often end in e. As there are many exceptions to these rules, each noun has to be learned together with its gender.
Examples:
- Masculine: om (man, human being), bou (ox), copac (tree);
- Neuter: drum (road), cadou (present, gift), exemplu (example);
- Feminine: bunică (grandmother), carte (book), cafea (coffee).
For nouns designating people and animals the grammatical gender can only be masculine or feminine, and is strictly determined by the biological sex, no matter the phonetics of the noun. For example nouns like tată (father) and popă (priest) are masculine as they refer to male people, although phonetically they are similar to a large category of feminine nouns.
For native speakers the general rule for determining a noun's gender relies on the "one-two" test, which consists in inflecting the noun to both the singular and the plural, together with the numbers
Romanian numbers
The Romanian numbers are the system of number names used in Romanian to express counts, quantities, ranks in ordered sets, fractions, multiplication, and other information related to numbers....
one and two. Depending on the gender, the numbers will have different forms for each of the three genders, as illustrated below.
- Masculine: un om, doi oameni (one human being, two human beings), un iepure, doi iepuri (one rabbit, two rabbits). In this case both un and doi are in their masculine forms.
- Feminine: o fată, două fete (one girl, two girls), o pasăre, două păsări (one bird, two birds). In this case both o and două are in their feminine forms.
- Neuter: un corp, două corpuri (one body, two bodies), un sertar, două sertare (one drawer, two drawers). In this case un is in its masculine form while două is in its feminine form. This is the only case in which the two numbers have different genders.
Note: Romanian numbers
Romanian numbers
The Romanian numbers are the system of number names used in Romanian to express counts, quantities, ranks in ordered sets, fractions, multiplication, and other information related to numbers....
generally have a single form regardless of the gender of the determined noun. Exceptions are the numbers un/o (one) doi/două (two) and all the numbers made up of two or more digits when the last digit is 1 or 2; these have masculine and feminine forms. Unlike languages such as Russian
Russian language
Russian is a Slavic language used primarily in Russia, Belarus, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. It is an unofficial but widely spoken language in Ukraine, Moldova, Latvia, Turkmenistan and Estonia and, to a lesser extent, the other countries that were once constituent republics...
, in Romanian there is no neutral form for numbers, adjectives or other noun determiners.
Number
Romanian has two numbersGrammatical number
In linguistics, grammatical number is a grammatical category of nouns, pronouns, and adjective and verb agreement that expresses count distinctions ....
: singular and plural
Plural
In linguistics, plurality or [a] plural is a concept of quantity representing a value of more-than-one. Typically applied to nouns, a plural word or marker is used to distinguish a value other than the default quantity of a noun, which is typically one...
. Morphologically the plural form is built by adding specific endings to the singular form. For example, nominative nouns without the definite article form the plural by adding one of the endings -i, -uri, -e, or -le. The plural formation mechanism, often involving other changes in the word structure, is an intrinsic property of each noun and has to be learned together with it.
Examples:
- -i: pom - pomi (tree), cal - cai (horse), tată - tați (father), barcă - bărci (boat);
- -uri: tren - trenuri (train), treabă - treburi (job, task), cort - corturi (tent);
- -e: pai - paie (straw), masă - mese (table, meal), teatru - teatre (theater), muzeu - muzee (museum);
- -le: stea - stele (star), cafea - cafele (coffee), pijama - pijamale (pajama).
Case
Romanian has inherited from Latin five casesDeclension
In linguistics, declension is the inflection of nouns, pronouns, adjectives, and articles to indicate number , case , and gender...
: nominative, genitive, dative, accusative, and vocative. Morphologically the nominative and the accusative are identical; similarly the genitive and the dative share the same form. The vocative is less used as it is normally restricted to nouns designating people or things which can be addressed directly; additionally, nouns in the vocative often borrow the nominative form even when there is a distinct vocative form available.
The genitive-dative form can be derived from the nominative. If the noun is determined by an indefinite article then the genitive-dative mark is applied to the article, not to the noun, for example un băiat - unui băiat (a boy - of/to a boy); for feminine nouns the form used in the singular is most often identical to the plural, for example o carte - unei cărți - două cărți (a book - of/to a book - two books). Similarly, if the noun is determined by the definite article (enclitic in Romanian, see that section), the genitive-dative mark is added at the end of the noun together with the article, for example băiatul - băiatului (the boy - of/to the boy), cartea - cărții (the book - of/to the book). Masculine proper names designating people form the genitive-dative by placing the article lui before the noun: lui Brâncuși (of/to Brancusi); the same applies to feminine names only when they don't have a typically feminine ending: lui Carmen.
In usual genitival phrases such as numele trandafirului (the name of the rose), the genitive is only recognized by the specific ending (-lui in this example) and no other words are necessary. However, in other situations, usually if the noun modified by the genitive attribute is indefinite, the genitival article is required, as for example in câteva opere ale scriitorului (some of the writer's works).
Romanian dative phrases exhibit clitic doubling
Clitic doubling
In linguistics, clitic doubling, or pronominal reduplication is a phenomenon by which clitic pronouns appear in verb phrases together with the full noun phrases that they refer to .Clitic doubling is found in many languages, including Albanian, Arumanian, Macedonian, Bulgarian,...
similar to that in Spanish
Spanish language
Spanish , also known as Castilian , is a Romance language in the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several languages and dialects in central-northern Iberia around the 9th century and gradually spread with the expansion of the Kingdom of Castile into central and southern Iberia during the...
, in which the noun in the dative is doubled by a pronoun. The position of this pronoun in the sentence depends on the mood
Grammatical mood
In linguistics, grammatical mood is a grammatical feature of verbs, used to signal modality. That is, it is the use of verbal inflections that allow speakers to express their attitude toward what they are saying...
and tense
Grammatical tense
A tense is a grammatical category that locates a situation in time, to indicate when the situation takes place.Bernard Comrie, Aspect, 1976:6:...
of the verb
Verb
A verb, from the Latin verbum meaning word, is a word that in syntax conveys an action , or a state of being . In the usual description of English, the basic form, with or without the particle to, is the infinitive...
. For example, in the sentence Le dau un cadou părinților (I give a present to [my] parents), the pronoun le doubles the noun părinților without bringing any additional information.
As specified above, the vocative case in Romanian has a special form for most nouns, but for convenience reasons the form of the nominative is often employed. The traditional vocative is retained in speech, however, in informal speech, or by people living in the countryside. It is seen as a mark of unrefined speech by the majority of city-dwellers, who refrain from its usage. The forms of the vocative are as follows. (Note that the vocative does not have both definite and indefinite forms, as it is not used with any specific function within sentences. The following rules are to be applied for the indefinite form of the nouns):
- Singular feminine nouns and proper names ending in an unstressed -ă/-a take the ending -o e.g. fată → fato (girl!) some popular plurals are different, though: Maria → Mărie! (Mary!)
- Singular feminine nouns ending in an unstressed -e take the ending -eo e.g. punte → punteo! (bridge!) although sometimes the e is dropped altogether
- Singular feminine nouns ending in a stressed -a take the ending -auo e.g. nuia → nuiauo! (stick!)
- Singular masculine and neuter nouns ending in a consonant take the ending -ule e.g. băiat → băiatule! (boy!) the vocative for animate nouns is sometimes formed as if the noun were a proper name: băiat → băiete! (see below)
- Singular masculine and neuter nouns ending in unstressed -e/-ă take no extra ending (-Ø) e.g. frate → frate! (brother!)
- Masculine proper names take the ending -e e.g. Ștefan → Ștefane! (Stephen!) some words also experience some change in their vowels (Ion → Ioane! John!)
- All plural nouns take the ending -lor e.g. mere → merelor! (apples!)
Definite article
An often cited peculiarity of Romanian, which it shares with Aromanian, Megleno-Romanian, and Istro-Romanian, is that, unlike all other Romance languages, the definite articleDefinite Article
Definite Article is the title of British comedian Eddie Izzard's 1996 performance released on VHS. It was recorded on different nights at the Shaftesbury Theatre...
s are attached to the end of the noun as enclitics (as in Bulgarian, Macedonian, Albanian, and North Germanic languages
North Germanic languages
The North Germanic languages or Scandinavian languages, the languages of Scandinavians, make up one of the three branches of the Germanic languages, a sub-family of the Indo-European languages, along with the West Germanic languages and the extinct East Germanic languages...
) instead of in front. These enclitic definite articles are believed to have been formed, as in other Romance languages, from Latin demonstrative pronouns. The table below shows the generally accepted etymology
Etymology
Etymology is the study of the history of words, their origins, and how their form and meaning have changed over time.For languages with a long written history, etymologists make use of texts in these languages and texts about the languages to gather knowledge about how words were used during...
of the Romanian definite article.
| Masculine | Feminine | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Singular | Plural | Singular | Plural | |
| Nominative Accusative |
Lat. illum → Rom. -lu → -l, -le |
Lat. illi → Rom. -l'i → -i |
Lat. illa → Rom. -euă → -eau → -a |
Lat. illae → Rom. -le |
| Genitive Dative |
Lat. illui → Rom. -lui |
Lat. illorum → Rom. -lor |
Lat. illaei → Rom. -ei |
Lat. illorum → Rom. -lor |
Examples:
- Masculine nouns (singular, nominative/accusative):
- codru - codrul (forest - the forest);
- pom - pomul (tree - the tree);
- frate - fratele (brother - the brother);
- tată - tatăl (father - the father).
- Neuter nouns (singular, nominative/accusative):
- teatru - teatrul (theater - the theater);
- loc - locul (place - the place);
- Feminine nouns (singular, nominative/accusative):
- casă - casa (house - the house);
- floare - floarea (flower - the flower);
- cutie - cutia (box - the box);
- stea - steaua (star - the star);
Indefinite article
The Romanian indefinite article, unlike the definite article, is placed before the noun, and has likewise derived from Latin:| Masculine | Feminine | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Singular | Plural | Singular | Plural | |
| Nominative Accusative |
Lat. unum → Rom. un |
Lat. ne scio → Rom. niște |
Lat. unam → Rom. o |
Lat. ne scio → Rom. niște |
| Genitive Dative |
Lat. unius → Rom. unui |
Lat. unorum → Rom. unor |
Lat. unae → Rom. unei |
Lat. unorum → Rom. unor |
Nouns in the vocative case cannot be determined by an indefinite article.
Examples of indefinite article usage:
- Masculine:
- nominative/accusative: singular un copil (a child) - plural niște copii ([some] children);
- genitive/dative: singular unui copil (of/to a child) - plural unor copii (of/to [some] children);
- Neuter:
- nominative/accusative: singular un loc (a place) - plural niște locuri ([some] places);
- genitive/dative: singular unui loc (of/to a place) - plural unor locuri (of/to [some] places);
- Feminine:
- nominative/accusative: singular o masă (a table) - plural niște mese ([some] tables);
- genitive/dative: singular unei mese (of/to a table) - plural unor mese (of/to [some] tables);
Article appended to adjectives
When a nounNoun
In linguistics, a noun is a member of a large, open lexical category whose members can occur as the main word in the subject of a clause, the object of a verb, or the object of a preposition .Lexical categories are defined in terms of how their members combine with other kinds of...
is determined by an adjective
Adjective
In grammar, an adjective is a 'describing' word; the main syntactic role of which is to qualify a noun or noun phrase, giving more information about the object signified....
, the normal word order is noun + adjective, and the article (definite or indefinite) is appended to the noun. However, the word order adjective + noun is also possible (and mostly used for emphasis on the adjective), in which pattern the article and any case marker that may be present is applied to the adjective instead. Examples follow.
- Noun + adjective (normal order):
- un student bun (a good student);
- studentul bun (the good student);
- unui student bun (to a good student);
- studentului bun (to the good student).
- Adjective + noun (reversed order):
- un bun student (a good student);
- bunul student (the good student);
- unui bun student (to a good student);
- bunului student (to the good student).
Genitival article
There are situations in Romanian when the noun in the genitive requires the presence of the so-called genitival (or possessive) article (see for example the section "Genitive" in "Romanian nounsRomanian nouns
This article on Romanian nouns is related to the Romanian grammar and belongs to a series of articles on the Romanian language. It describes the morphology of the noun in this language, and includes details about its declension according to number, case, and application of the definite article, all...
"), somewhat similar to the English preposition of, for example in a map of China. In Romanian this becomes o hartă a Chinei, where "a" is the genitival article. The table below shows how the genitival articles depend on gender and number.
| Masculine | Neuter | Feminine | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Singular | al | a | |
| Plural | ai | ale | |
The genitival article also has genitive/dative forms, which are used only with a possessive pronoun. They are: alui (m. sg.), alei (f. sg.), and alor (pl., both genders). These forms are rarely used—especially the singular ones—and the sentences are usually rephrased to avoid them.
Adjectives
Romanian adjectives determine the quality of things. They are always determinants of a noun, pronoun, numeral or copulative verb, so they can only fulfill the syntactical functions of attribute and adjectival complement, which in Romanian is called nume predicativ (nominal predicativeComplement (linguistics)
In grammar the term complement is used with different meanings. The primary meaning is a word, phrase or clause that is necessary in a sentence to complete its meaning. We find complements that function as an argument and complements that exist within arguments.Both complements and modifiers add...
)
Adjective inflection
| Singular | Plural | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Masculine | frumos | frumoși | |
| Feminine | frumoasă | frumoase | |
The number of different forms an adjective takes only in the singular are called endings, terminații. Similarly, the number of different forms an adjective takes in both the singular and the plural are called flexionary forms, forme flexionare. The adjective frumos (beautiful) has 2 endings, and 4 flexionary forms. (see above table)
| Singular | Plural | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Masculine | verde | verzi | |
| Feminine | verde | verzi | |
The adjective verde (green) on the other hand, has 1 ending and 2 flexionary forms.
| Singular | Plural | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Masculine | oranj | oranj | |
| Feminine | oranj | oranj | |
The foreign borrowed adjective oranj (orange) is called invariable, as it has only 1 ending, and 1 flexionary form. Adjectives that do not have only 1 flexionary form (and thus 1 ending) are called variable.
Adjective syntax
Syntactical functions of the adjective can be:- Attribute, in case it defines a noun, pronoun or numeral. (e.g.: The blond boy is here. Băiatul blond este aici.)
- Adjectival complement, in case it defines a copulative verb. (e.g.: The boy is blond. Băiatul este blond.)
Degrees of comparison
An adjective also can have degrees of comparison.- Positive Degree (frumos, beautiful)
- Comparative Degree:
- Of superiority (mai frumos, more beautiful)
- Of equality (la fel de frumos, as beautiful as)
- Of inferiority (mai puțin frumos, less beautiful)
- Superlative Degree:
- Relative Superlative
- Of superiority (cel mai frumos, the most beautiful)
- Of inferiority (cel mai puțin frumos, the least beautiful)
- Absolute Superlative (foarte frumos, very beautiful)
- Relative Superlative
Personal pronouns
Personal pronouns come in four different casesGrammatical case
In grammar, the case of a noun or pronoun is an inflectional form that indicates its grammatical function in a phrase, clause, or sentence. For example, a pronoun may play the role of subject , of direct object , or of possessor...
, depending on their usage in the phrase.
Nominative case
There are eight personal pronouns (pronume personale) in Romanian:| Singular | Plural | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| First person | eu | noi | |
| Second person | tu | voi | |
| Third person | Masc. | el | ei |
| Fem. | ea | ele | |
The pronouns above are those in the nominative case
Nominative case
The nominative case is one of the grammatical cases of a noun or other part of speech, which generally marks the subject of a verb or the predicate noun or predicate adjective, as opposed to its object or other verb arguments...
. They are usually omitted in Romanian unless required to disambiguate the meaning of a sentence. Usually, the verb ending provides information about the subject. The feminine forms of plural pronouns are only used for groups of persons of items of exclusively female gender. If the group contains elements of both genders, the masculine form is used. Pronouns in the vocative case
Vocative case
The vocative case is the case used for a noun identifying the person being addressed and/or occasionally the determiners of that noun. A vocative expression is an expression of direct address, wherein the identity of the party being spoken to is set forth expressly within a sentence...
in Romanian, which is used for exclamations, or summoning, also take the forms of the nominative case.
Accusative case
The accusativeAccusative case
The accusative case of a noun is the grammatical case used to mark the direct object of a transitive verb. The same case is used in many languages for the objects of prepositions...
forms of the pronouns come in two forms: a stressed and an unstressed form:
| Singular | Plural | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Stressed | Unstressed | Stressed | Unstressed | ||
| First person | (pe) mine | mă | (pe) noi | ne | |
| Second person | (pe) tine | te | (pe) voi | vă | |
| Third person | Masc. | (pe) el | îl | (pe) ei | îi |
| Fem. | (pe) ea | o | (pe) ele | le | |
The stressed form of the pronoun is used (in phrases that are not inverted
Inversion (linguistics)
In linguistics, grammatical inversion is any of a number of different distinct grammatical constructions in the languages of the world. There are three main uses in the literature which, unfortunately, have little if any overlap either formally or typologically: syntactic inversion, thematic...
) after the verb, while the unstressed form is employed before the verb. Romanian requires both forms of a pronoun to be present in a sentence, if a relative clause
Relative clause
A relative clause is a subordinate clause that modifies a noun phrase, most commonly a noun. For example, the phrase "the man who wasn't there" contains the noun man, which is modified by the relative clause who wasn't there...
is employed, which also reverses the order of the forms (stressed before unstressed). Otherwise, the stressed form is usually left out, the only exception being its usage for adding emphasis to the pronoun.
- Îl văd - I see him/it (a statement of fact)
- Îl văd pe el - I see him (It is him that I see, and no other)
- Fata pe care o văd - The girl whom I see
Dative case
The dativeDative case
The dative case is a grammatical case generally used to indicate the noun to whom something is given, as in "George gave Jamie a drink"....
forms of the pronouns:
| Singular | Plural | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Stressed | Unstressed | Stressed | Unstressed | ||
| First person | mie | îmi | nouă | ne | |
| Second person | ție | îți | vouă | vă | |
| Third person | Masc. | lui | îi | lor | le |
| Fem. | ei | îi | lor | le | |
Genitive case
The genitiveGenitive case
In grammar, genitive is the grammatical case that marks a noun as modifying another noun...
forms of the pronouns (also called possessive pronouns, pronume posesive):
| Singular | Plural | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Masculine | Feminine | Neutrum | Masculine | Feminine | Neutrum | |||
| Singular | First person | al meu | a mea | al meu | ai mei | ale mele | ale mele | |
| Second person | al tău | a ta | al tău | ai tăi | ale tale | ale tale | ||
| Third person | Masc. | al lui | a lui | al lui | ai lui | ale lui | ale lui | |
| Fem. | al ei | a ei | al ei | ai ei | ale ei | ale ei | ||
| Plural | First person | al nostru | a noastră | al nostru | ai noștri | ale noastre | ale noastre | |
| Second person | al vostru | a voastră | al vostru | ai voștri | ale voastre | ale voastre | ||
| Third person | al lor | a lor | al lor | ai lor | ale lor | ale lor | ||
Notice particularly the retention of the genitive inflection in the third person: the pronoun, like Latin eius, eorum, inflects according to the possessor, not the possessed.
Reflexive pronouns
There are the forms of the reflexive pronouns (pronume reflexive):| Accusative | Dative | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Singular | Plural | Singular | Plural | |
| First person | pe mine / mă | pe noi / ne | mie / îmi | nouă / ne |
| Second person | pe tine / te | pe voi / vă | ție / îți | vouă / vă |
| Third person | pe sine / se | sieși / își | ||
The above reflexive pronouns are in the accusative and dative cases, and in both stressed / unstressed forms. As is made clear, the reflexive pronouns are identical to the personal pronouns, with the exception of the 3rd person, which has entirely new forms. The genitival forms of the reflexive pronouns are the same for the 1st and 2nd persons, but also differ in the 3rd person singular, which is al său. This is a direct continuation of Latin usage; Latin suus was used only when the possessor was the subject of the sentence.
Polite pronouns
The polite pronouns (pronumele de politețe) are a way of addressing someone formally. They are normally used for interaction with strangers, or by children talking to adults whom they don't know well, or to teachers as a sign of respect. When used in the plural, the second person pronoun is a polite one, for use in formal occasions, or among unacquainted adults, whereas its singular forms are less polite, their use having become pejorative in modern use (see below).The polite pronouns were derived from old Romanian phrases used for addressing the sovereign
Domnitor
Domnitor was the official title of the ruler of the United Principalities of Wallachia and Moldavia between 1859 and 1866....
, such as Domnia Ta, Domnia Voastră, Domnia Lui ("Your Majesty", "Your Majesty (plural)", "His Majesty", literally "Your Reign", etc.). By means of vowel elision, domnia became shortened to dumnea.
The polite pronouns all have the same forms in all cases (the only exception being dumneata, with the genitive/dative form of dumitale), and they exist only in the second and third person, due to them not being used to refer to oneself:
| Singular | Plural | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Second person | dumneata | dumneavoastră | |
| Third person | Masc. | dumnealui | dumnealor |
| Fem. | dumneaei | ||
The second person singular denotes a level of politeness that is between that of tu and that of dumneavoastră. However, it is considered by some to be of the same degree of politeness as tu. It is generally found in conversation where old people are involved, as its use is slowly deprecating in favour of dumneavoastră.
Demonstrative Pronouns
There are a lot of demonstrative pronouns (pronume demonstrative) in Romanian. They are classified as: pronume de apropiere, pronume de depărtare, pronume de diferențiere, pronume de identitate, which mean, respectively, pronouns of proximity, pronouns of remoteness, pronouns of differentiation, and pronouns of identity.Pronouns of proximity and remoteness
These pronouns describe objects which are either close to the speaker, or farther away from the speaker:| Pronoun of Proximity | Pronoun of Remoteness | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Singular | Plural | Singular | Plural | |
| Masculine | acesta | aceștia | acela | aceia |
| Feminine | aceasta | acestea | aceea | acelea |
| Neutrum | acesta | acestea | acela | acelea |
Pronouns of differentiation and identity
These pronouns describe objects which are either different from an aforementioned object, or one and the same:| Pronoun of Differentiation | Pronoun of Identity | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Singular | Plural | Singular | Plural | |
| Masculine | celălalt | ceilalți | același | aceiași |
| Feminine | cealaltă | celelalte | aceeași | aceleași |
| Neutrum | celălalt | celelalte | același | aceleași |
Intensive pronouns
The intensive pronouns and adjectives are used for emphasis. They are often misused by native speakerNative Speaker
Native Speaker is Chang-Rae Lee’s first novel. In Native Speaker, he creates a man named Henry Park who tries to assimilate into American society and become a “native speaker.”-Plot summary:...
s because of the many similar-sounding forms. The forms in parentheses are the corresponding personal pronouns:
| Intensive pronoun | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Singular | Plural | |||||
| Masculine | Feminine | Neutrum | Masculine | Feminine | Neutrum | |
| First Person | însumi | însămi | însumi | înșine | însene | însene |
| Second Person | însuți | însăți | însuți | înșivă | însevă | însevă |
| Third Person | însuși | însăși | însuși | înșiși | înseși | înseși |
Relative and interrogative pronouns
Pronumele relative și interogative, these two types of pronouns are identical in form, but differ in usage. The relative pronouns are used to connect relative clauseRelative clause
A relative clause is a subordinate clause that modifies a noun phrase, most commonly a noun. For example, the phrase "the man who wasn't there" contains the noun man, which is modified by the relative clause who wasn't there...
s to their main clause, whereas interrogative pronouns are used to form questions. The interrogative pronouns are usually written out with a question mark
Question mark
The question mark , is a punctuation mark that replaces the full stop at the end of an interrogative sentence in English and many other languages. The question mark is not used for indirect questions...
after them, to differentiate them from their relative counterparts.
The most common relative/interrogative pronouns are
| Relative Pronoun | cine | (a/al/ai/ale) cui | care | pe care | ce | (a/al/ai/ale) cărui(a)/cărei(a)/căror(a) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| English translation | who | (whose), to whom | which | which/whom | which/whom | (whose), to whom |
Negative and indefinite pronouns
Pronumele negative și nehotărâte, these two types of pronouns are used to express negation, as well as indefinite concepts. There are many indefinite pronouns, but only a limited number of negative pronouns.The most common indefinite pronouns are:
| Indefinite Pronoun | mult | tot | unul/una | altul/alta | atât | puțin/nițel | destul |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| English translation | much | all | one | other | so much/as much | a little | enough |
The most common negative pronouns are:
| Negative Pronoun | nimeni/nimenea | nimic/nimica | niciunul/niciuna | niciunui(a)/niciunei(a) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| English translation | nobody | nothing | none | to none (of none) |
Numbers
In Romanian grammar, unlike English, the words representing numberNumber
A number is a mathematical object used to count and measure. In mathematics, the definition of number has been extended over the years to include such numbers as zero, negative numbers, rational numbers, irrational numbers, and complex numbers....
s are considered to form a distinct part of speech, called numeral (plural: numerale). Examples:
- Cardinal
- Proper: doi (two);
- Multiplicative: îndoit (double);
- Collective: amândoi (both);
- Distributive: câte doi (in twos);
- Fractional: doime (half);
- Adverbial: de două ori (twice);
- Ordinal: al doilea (the second).
Verbs
As in all Romance languagesRomance languages
The Romance languages are a branch of the Indo-European language family, more precisely of the Italic languages subfamily, comprising all the languages that descend from Vulgar Latin, the language of ancient Rome...
, Romanian verb
Verb
A verb, from the Latin verbum meaning word, is a word that in syntax conveys an action , or a state of being . In the usual description of English, the basic form, with or without the particle to, is the infinitive...
s are highly inflected according to person, number, tense, mood, voice. The usual word order in sentences is SVO (Subject - Verb - Object). Romanian verbs are categorized into four large conjugation groups depending on the ending in the infinitive mood. The actual conjugation patterns for each group are multiple.
- First conjugation: verbs ending in –a (alternatively -are), such as a da (to give), a cânta (to sing), including those ending in hiatusHiatus (linguistics)In phonology, hiatus or diaeresis refers to two vowel sounds occurring in adjacent syllables, with no intervening consonant. When two adjacent vowel sounds occur in the same syllable, the result is instead described as a diphthong....
ea such as in a crea (to create); - Second conjugation: verbs ending in –ea (shortened from -are) (only when ea is a diphthongDiphthongA diphthong , also known as a gliding vowel, refers to two adjacent vowel sounds occurring within the same syllable. Technically, a diphthong is a vowel with two different targets: That is, the tongue moves during the pronunciation of the vowel...
), such as a putea (can), a cădea (to fall); - Third conjugation: verbs ending in –e' (alternatively -ere)', such as a vinde (to sell), a crede (to believe);
- Fourth conjugation: verbs ending in –i/ire or –î/îre, such as a veni(re) (to come), a urî(re) (to hate).
Adverbs
In Romanian, adverbAdverb
An adverb is a part of speech that modifies verbs or any part of speech other than a noun . Adverbs can modify verbs, adjectives , clauses, sentences, and other adverbs....
s usually determine verbs (but could also modify a clause or an entire sentence) by adding a qualitative description to the action. Romanian adverbs are invariant and are identical in shape (being both homophone
Homophone
A homophone is a word that is pronounced the same as another word but differs in meaning. The words may be spelled the same, such as rose and rose , or differently, such as carat, caret, and carrot, or to, two, and too. Homophones that are spelled the same are also both homographs and homonyms...
s and homograph
Homograph
A homograph is a word or a group of words that share the same written form but have different meanings. When spoken, the meanings may be distinguished by different pronunciations, in which case the words are also heteronyms. Words with the same writing and pronunciation A homograph (from the ,...
s) to the corresponding adjective in its masculine singular form. A remarkable counterexample for this is the adjective-adverb pair bun-bine ("good" (masculine singular) - "well").
Some examples are
- Băieții sunt jucători buni. - The boys are good players. (adjective)
- Băieții joacă bine. - The boys play well. (adverb)
- Cântecul acesta este frumos. - This song is beautiful. (adjective)
- Cântăreața cântă frumos. - The singer sings beautifully. (adverb)
Prepositions
The preposition before a noun determines which case the noun must take.No prepositions take nouns in the nominative case.
Prepositions with accusative
- pe is used to introduce a direct object when it is represented by a proper name, in which case it does not have a lexical meaning. Pe is also used with the accusative to introduce a circumstantial object of location (engl. on).
- cu (with) introduces the instrument of the action. It is used to indicate (among others) one's conversation partner, an association with an object, or a means of transport.
- la (at) indicates the location or time of the action or its direction. More specific forms are în (in), spre (towards), pe la (around)
- pentru (for) indicates the scope of an action, or the beneficiary thereof.
Prepositions with dative
The only prepositions that demand the Dative Case, are: grație, datorită, mulțumită, conform, contrar, potrivit, aidoma, asemeneaPrepositions with genitive
Other prepositions require the genitive case of nouns. Note that some prepositions of this sort have evolved from phrases with feminine nouns and, as a consequence, require a feminine possessive form when the object is a pronoun; e.g., împotriva mea (against me).Interjections
In Romanian there are many interjections, and they are commonly used. Those that denote sounds made by animals or objects are called onomatopee, a form similar to the English language onomatopoeia. Below, some interjections and their approximative equivalent in English are shown.Common interjections
- Vai! - Oh, my! / Oh, dear!
- Ah! - same as in English
- Oau! - Wow!
- Of! - equivalent to a sigh
- Hmmm... - said when thinking
- Mamă-mamă - said when expressing something cool or extraordinary
- Iată - somewhat like behold!
Onomatopoeia
- lip-lip - the sound made when slurping liquids (usually by dogs)
- țuști - a sound designating a quick move
- mor-mor - the sound a bear makes
- cucurigu - the sound a rooster makes, cock-a-doodle-doo!
- ham-ham - the sound a dog makes, bark!
- miauuu - the sound a cat makes, meow!
- cip-cirip - the sound birds make, chirp!
- mu - the sound a cow makes, moo!
Use within sentences
Within a sentence, interjections can function as attributes, verbal equivalents, or they can be used as filler, which has no syntactical function at all.- Attribute: Mi-am luat o fustă mamă-mamă. I bought a cool skirt.
- Verbal Equivalent: Iată-l pe Ion. Look, there is Ion
- Filler: Hmmm... Mă gândesc ce să fac. Hmmm... I am thinking about what to do.
Phrase syntax
Romanian has terminology and rules for phrase syntax, which describes the way simple sentences relate to one another within a single complex sentence. There are many functions a simple sentence may take, their number usually being determined by the number of predicatePredicate (grammar)
There are two competing notions of the predicate in theories of grammar. Traditional grammar tends to view a predicate as one of two main parts of a sentence, the other being the subject, which the predicate modifies. The other understanding of predicates is inspired from work in predicate calculus...
s. It is also noteworthy that Romanian terminology for the terms simple sentence
Simple sentence
A simple sentence is a sentence structure that contains one independent clause and no dependent clauses.-Examples:*The runner jumped....
, complex sentence
Complex sentence
A complex sentence is a sentence with one independent clause and at least one dependent clause.-Examples:* I ate the meal that you cooked....
, and phrase
Phrase
In everyday speech, a phrase may refer to any group of words. In linguistics, a phrase is a group of words which form a constituent and so function as a single unit in the syntax of a sentence. A phrase is lower on the grammatical hierarchy than a clause....
is somewhat counterintuitive. The Romanian term propoziție means as much as simple sentence (or clause). To describe a complex sentence (or compound sentence
Compound sentence (linguistics)
A compound sentence is composed of at least two independent clauses. It does not require a dependent clause. The clauses are joined by a coordinating conjunction , a correlative conjunction , a semicolon that functions as a conjunction, or a conjunctive adverb preceded by a semicolon. A conjunction...
), Romanian uses the word frază, which can cause confusion with the English word phrase, which describes not a complex sentence, but a grouping of words. In consequence, Romanian doesn't have terms for the English noun phrase
Noun phrase
In grammar, a noun phrase, nominal phrase, or nominal group is a phrase based on a noun, pronoun, or other noun-like word optionally accompanied by modifiers such as adjectives....
, or verb phrase
Verb phrase
In linguistics, a verb phrase or VP is a syntactic unit composed of at least one verb and the dependents of that verb. One can distinguish between two types of VPs, finite VPs and non-finite VPs . While phrase structure grammars acknowledge both, dependency grammars reject the existence of a...
, preferring the more commonly understood term predicate for the latter. The former has no formal equivalent in Romanian.
Simple sentences can be of two types: main clauses and subordinate clauses
Main clause
The main clause, within a complex sentence, does not rely on another sentence to be fully understood. In other words, it has stand-alone meaning. The following example has the verb phrase underlined.Example:
- Am văzut copiii din curtea școlii.
- I have seen the children in the school courtyard.
Even though this sentence is long, it is still composed of a single simple sentence, which is a main clause.
Subordinate clause
A subordinate clause cannot have stand-alone meaning. It relies on a main clause to give it meaning. It usually determines or defines an element of another clause, be it a main clause, or a subordinate one. The following example has the verb phrase underlined, and the element of relation, which is to say, the relative pronoun used to link the two sentences, is bold. The sentences are also separated and numbered.Example:
- Am văzut copiii 1/ care sunt în curtea școlii. 2/
- I have seen the children 1/ who are in the school courtyard. 2/
There are also subordinate clauses other than the relative clause, which is an attributive clause, since it determines a noun, pronoun or numeral, and not a verb phrase. Here is a list of examples illustrating some of the remaining cases:
Direct Object Clause (propoziție subordonată completivă directă):
- Înțeleg 1/
Indirect Object Clause (propoziție subordonată completivă indirectă):
- Ma gandesc 1/
Subject
Subject (grammar)
The subject is one of the two main constituents of a clause, according to a tradition that can be tracked back to Aristotle and that is associated with phrase structure grammars; the other constituent is the predicate. According to another tradition, i.e...
Clause (propoziție subordonată subiectivă):
- Ceea ce
Local Circumstantial Object Clause (propoziție subordonată completivă circumstanțială de loc):
- Mă văd cu Ionuț 1/ unde (mi-)a propus el. 2/
- I am meeting Johnny 1/ where he proposed (to me). 2/
Clauses introduced by coordinating conjunctions
Some conjunctionsConjunctions
Conjunctions, is a biannual American literary journal based at Bard College. It was founded in 1981 and is currently edited by Bradford Morrow....
are called coordinating because they do not define the type of clause introduced. Rather, they coordinate an existing clause with another, making the new clause of the same type as the other one. The coordinating conjunctions are of four types (note that the list is not exhaustive):
- The copulative conjunctions are: și (and), nici (neither), and precum și (as well as).
- The adversative conjunctions are: dar/însă/ci (but) and iar (on the other hand).
- The disjunctive conjunctions are: sau/ori/fie (or/either).
- The conclusive conjunctions are: deci/așadar (thus), în concluzie (in conclusion), and prin urmare (therefore).
An example of two main clauses (1, 2) linked together by a coordinative conjunction (bold) is:
- Ana este o fată 1/ și Ion este un băiat. 2/
- Ana is a girl, 1/ and Ion is a boy. 2/
Two subordinate clauses (2, 3) can also be joined to the same end:
- V-am spus despre băiatul 1/ care este la mine în clasă, 2/ și care este foarte bun la matematică. 3/
- I have told you about the boy 1/ who is in my class, 2/ and who is very good in mathematics. 3/
The same effect of two main clauses (1, 2) being tied together can also be achieved via juxtaposition of the sentences using a comma:
- Am păzit palatul, 1/ palatul era și foarte greu de păzit. 2/
- I guarded the palace, 1/ the palace was very hard to guard, too. 2/
External links
- Very detailed Romanian grammar (PDF; 183 pages; 4.6 MB)
- Verbix: Romanian verbs conjugation (Attention: Generally good output, but a few verbs are not conjugated correctly.)
- Romanian <-> English online dictionary and Romanian verb conjugator (few mistakes)
- Romanian online dictionary and lemmatizer