1. Nouns – gender
In Italian, nouns are either masculine or feminine by gender.
The gender of living things is determined by their biological gender:
l’uomo man – la donna woman
il gatto cat – la gatta female cat
The gender of non-living things is random and therefore purely grammatical.
Masculine nouns usually end in -o: il giorno day, il libro book, il tavolo table.
Exceptions: la mano hand, la radio radio, la foto photograph (abbreviated form of la fotografia).
They also sometimes end in -e: il sole sun, il latte milk, il dente tooth.
Most of these nouns have one of the following endings: -are, -ore, -one, -ale, -ile, -ule, -ante, -ente.
EXAMPLES:
il mare sea
il colore colour
il balcone balcony
il giornale newspaper
il campanile church tower
l’istante moment
l’incidente accident
Finally, masculine nouns sometimes end in a consonant, and these are of foreign origin: il film movie, lo sport sport, il bar bar, il computer computer.
The following categories usually consist of masculine nouns: plants, months and weekdays (exception: la domenica Sunday), the names of seas, mountains, rivers and lakes, as well as cardinal points. There are of course exceptions.
Feminine nouns usually end in -a: la casa house, la luna moon, la sera evening.
Exception: nouns ending in –ma (excluding la mamma mum) are masculine, e.g. il problema problem, il sistema system, il programma program, il pigiama pyjamas.
Feminine nouns also sometimes end in –e: la notte night, l’estate summer, la chiave key.
Most of these nouns have one of the following endings: -ione, -aggine, -igine, -uggine.
EXAMPLES:
la colazione breakfast
la stupidaggine stupid thing
l’origine origin
la ruggine rust
Nouns that end in -i also tend to be feminine: la crisi crisis, la diagnosi diagnosis.
The same goes for nouns that end in –tà or –tù: la città city, la gioventù youth.
The following categories usually consist of feminine nouns: fruits, continents, countries, areas, cities and islands as well as the names of festivities. There are exceptions here, too.
il giorno
la sera