Saying What Someone Is

Level 1

A nominal sentence has a subject and a nonverbal predicate identifying or describing it.

How It Works

Adjective descriptions show agreement: Il-ġnien sabiħ. “The garden is beautiful”, Il-kamra sabiħa. “The room is beautiful”, and Il-kmamar sbieħ. “The rooms are beautiful”. The adjective distinguishes masculine singular, feminine singular and plural.

A noun predicate identifies a role: Nora s-segretarja. “Nora is the secretary”. A pronoun can supply the subject: Jien student. “I am a student”, said by a male speaker. An indefinite noun need not have a separate equivalent of English “a”.

Compare the statement Il-ġnien sabiħ. with the noun-phrase fragment il-ġnien is-sabiħ “the beautiful garden”. In the latter, the adjective modifies the noun. Context and intonation matter: articleless adjectives after definite nouns can also have attributive readings. Overt pronominal links are available, with construction-dependent distribution. This present pattern does not apply mechanically to other tenses.

Examples (6)

  1. Il-ġnien sabiħ.

    The garden is beautiful.

    Masculine singular adjective predicate.

  2. Il-kamra sabiħa.

    The room is beautiful.

    Feminine singular adjective predicate.

  3. Il-kmamar sbieħ.

    The rooms are beautiful.

    Plural adjective predicate.

  4. Nora s-segretarja.

    Nora is the secretary.

    Identifying noun predicate.

  5. Jien student.

    I am a student.

    Male speaker with an indefinite noun predicate.

  6. il-ġnien is-sabiħ

    the beautiful garden

    Attributive noun-phrase fragment, contrasted with the clause.

How It Connects

Tap a pattern to see what it builds on and what it leads to.

Saying What Someone IsLevel 1

Learn Next

Patterns that build on this one.