French Attributive Adjectives - Adjectifs épithètes

Attributive adjectives are used to describe or emphasize some attribute (characteristic) of the noun they modify. Known as à ©pithà ¨tes in French, attributive adjectives are a subcategory of qualifying (descriptive) adjectives. The defining characteristic of attributive adjectives is that they are joined to the noun they modify - immediately preceding or following it with no verb in between. une jeune fille  Ã‚  Ã‚  young girlun nouveau livre  Ã‚  Ã‚  new bookune question intà ©ressante  Ã‚  Ã‚  interesting questionun restaurant cà ©là ¨bre  Ã‚  Ã‚  famous restaurant An attributive adjective emphasizes some aspect of the noun which is essential to the meaning of the noun but not necessarily to the sentence. That is, the à ©pithà ¨te can be dropped without changing the essential meaning of the sentence: Jai achetà © un nouveau livre rougeJai achetà © un nouveau livreJai achetà © un livre Both nouveau and rouge are attributive adjectives, and both can be dropped without hurting the essential meaning of the sentence: I bought a book. Including new and red simply provides additional information about the book that I bought. Types There are three types of attributive adjectives: Épithà ¨te de nature - indicates a permanent, inherent qualityun pà ¢le visage - pale faceune pomme rouge - red appleÉpithà ¨te de caractà ¨re - describes an individual, distinguishing qualityun cher ami - dear friendun homme honnà ªte - honest manÉpithà ¨te de circonstance - expresses a temporary, current qualityune jeune fille - young girlun garà §on triste - sad boy Agreement Attributive adjectives must agree in gender and number with the nouns they modify. Placement Like all descriptive French adjectives, the majority of à ©pithà ¨tes follow the noun they modify. However, à ©pithà ¨tes precede the noun when: the adjective noun is considered a single unit of meaningthe adjective is describing rather than qualifying (limiting) the meaning of the nounit just sounds better As you can see, there are no hard and fast rules for determining whether an à ©pithà ¨te should precede or follow the noun it modifies, but there are some general guidelines that can help: Precede the noun Follow the noun pithtes de nature pithtes de circonstance Figurative or subjective meaning Literal or objective meaning Size and beauty(petit, grand, joli...) Other physical qualities(rouge, carr, costaud...) Single-syllable adjective +multi-syllable noun Multi-syllable adjective +single-syllable noun Ordinal adjectives(premier, deuxime...) Categories + relationships(chrtien, franais, essentiel...) Age(jeune, vieux, nouveau...) Present participles and past participlesused as adjectives (courant, lu...) Goodness(bon, mauvais...) Modified adjectives(un raisin grand comme un abricot)