# Genders for sets of nouns and the noun itself



## Dymn

Hi,

This is unfortunately a question only for speakers of languages with (arbitrary) grammatical genders. Which gender do you use for the following nouns and for each of its items? Is it the same?

For example in Spanish it is:

Numbers: _el número - el tres _(m - m)
Months: _el mes - diciembre _(m - m)
Weekdays: _el día de la semana - el domingo_ (m - m)
Colours: _el color - el rojo _(m - m)
Letters:_ la letra - la eme_ (f - f)
Rivers:_ el río - el Danubio _(m - m)
Planets: _el planeta - Marte_ (m - m)

(same scheme for Catalan)

But it's not in German:

Numbers: _die Zahl - die Drei _(f - f)
Months: _der Monat - der Dezember _(m - m)
Weekdays: _der Wochentag - der Sonntag_ (m - m)
Colours: _die Farbe - das Rot _(f - n)
Letters:_ der Buchstabe - das M_ (m - n)
Rivers:_ der Fluss - die Donau _(m - f)*
Planets: _der Planet - der Mars _(m - m)*

What about your languages? You can add more categories if you find new ones.

* I was wrong, many rivers are masculine (_der Rhein, der Nil, der Amazonas, der Mississipi_), probably too many to be an exception at all. As for planets, 6 of them are masculine, while _die Venus _and _die Erde_ are feminine. Thanks @Frank78.


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## Perseas

Greek* :

Numbers: _ο αριθμός - το τρία (m - n)_
Months: _ο μήνας - ο Δεκέμβριος (m - m)_
Weekdays: _η ημέρα της εβδομάδας - η Κυριακή (f - f), but Saturday (Σάββατο) is neuter._
Colours: _το χρώμα - το κόκκινο (n - n) **_
Letters: _το γράμμα - το Μ (n - n)_
Rivers:_ το ποτάμι/ο ποταμός (formal) - ο Δούναβης (n/m - usually m)***
Planets: ο πλανήτης - ο ´Αρης (m - m) ****_

* The Greek words translate the respective Spanish and German words.
** "Κόκκινο" is an adjective of neuter gender, because it refers to the neuter noun "χρώμα" (το κόκκινο χρώμα). But when qualifying male and female nouns, it takes their gender.
*** About 99% of rivers in Greek are of masculine gender.
**** Earth (Γη) and Venus (Αφροδίτη) are feminine in Greek, all the rest planets are masculine.


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## Frank78

Dymn said:


> Rivers:_ der Fluss - die Donau _(m - f)
> Planets: _der Planet - der Mars _(m - m)



Depends which river, there are also masculine ones (der Rhein, der Mississippi), as well as there are feminine planets (die Venus)


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## symposium

Hi! I think that usually the specific noun matches the gender of the group because it is implied that (for example) "el nùmero"="el (nùmero) tres"/"el rio"="el (rio) Danubio"/"el dìa"="el (dìa de) martes" etc. Exceptions are precisely that, exceptions.


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## Yendred

French:

Numbers: _le nombre - le trois _(m - m)
Months: _le mois - n/a _(we don't say _le décembre, _but _le mois de décembre _or just _décembre)_
Weekdays: _le jour de la semaine - le dimanche_ (m - m)
Colours: _la couleur - le rouge _(f - m) (*)
Letters:_ la lettre - le m_ (f - m) (same as for colours)
Rivers:_ le fleuve / la rivière - le Danube / la Seine _(all cases) (**)
Planets: _la planète - n/a _(we don't say _la Mars, _but _la planète Mars _or just _Mars_). Exception: _la Terre (f)_

(*) Although the word _couleur _is feminine, all colour nouns are masculine, even if they come from feminine words  
For example: _*la *rose _(flower), _*le *rose_ (colour)

(**) "_un fleuve_" is a river which flows into the sea. "_une rivière_" is a river which flows into another river (being itself _un fleuve _or _une rivière_).
Some river names are masculine, some others are feminine, not depending on what they flow into, but depending on the history of the name, which may often be obscure.


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## Mahaodeh

In Arabic:
Numbers: hard to say, it generally depends on the thing being counted (is it one chair or one table for example). If you mean the number itself as a word, then then both because you have a masculine form and a feminine form for each number. If you mean number as used in math for example, then they are all masculine because it’s implied that you mean “the number one” ... etc, and the word number in Arabic is masculine. 

Months: all months in Arabic are masculine because ‘month’ is masculine. However, as a word (I mean not as a month) then 34 are masculine and two are feminine (it’s not a typo - 12 names borrowed from Latin, 12 borrowed from Aramaic through Syriac, and 12 Arabic), the two feminine ones are Jumada the 1st and 2nd, today used exclusively for lunar months so they don’t have an English equivalent.

Weekdays: all masculine because ‘day’ is masculine. As words, Saturday, Sunday, Monday, and Thursday are masculine while Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday are feminine.

Colours: same as numbers, it depends on what is being described and you have feminine and masculine forms for each. If you mean ‘the colour red’ for example then all are masculine because the word colour is masculine.

Letters: both! Interesting, right? There is only one form for each letter but It’s correct to use it as feminine because as words all letter names are feminine but it’s also correct to use it as masculine because the word ‘letter’ is masculine. In standard Arabic it’s more common to use the feminine, I’m not sure about dialects.

Rivers: as words, it depends on the name of the river, but they are mostly all treated as masculine because river is masculine.

Planets: like the others, the word may be masculine or feminine depending on the planet. Unlike the others you don’t treat them all the same. While the word ‘planet’ in Arabic is masculine, some planets are still treated as feminine despite that, for example Earth and Venus (al Ardh and al Zuhra) are always feminine.


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## Dymn

Frank78 said:


> Depends which river, there are also masculine ones (der Rhein, der Mississippi), as well as there are feminine planets (die Venus)


Oops, I should've checked first. Thanks for the correction!



Yendred said:


> Months: _le mois - n/a _(we don't say _le décembre, _but _le mois de décembre _or just _décembre)_





Yendred said:


> Planets: _la planète - n/a _(we don't say _la Mars, _but _la planète Mars _or just _Mars_). Exception: _la Terre (f)_


Spanish doesn't use an article before months and planet names (except for the Earth). (Catalan does before months, but not planet names). Anyway, there's an underlying gender which appears in many other cases, e.g. _el diciembre más frío de la década, Marte es muy bonito._


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## Yendred

Dymn said:


> Anyway, there's an underlying gender which appears in many other cases, e.g. _el diciembre más frío de la década, Marte es muy bonito._



Yes you are right. In this case, it is:
_m: Nous avons eu un décembre très doux _(_mois_ is implied)
_f: Mars est très belle ce soir _(_planète_ is implied)


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## Awwal12

In Russian gender is tightly related to noun morphology. If the noun ends in /-a/, isn't indeclinable and doesn't denote a man, it's doomed to be feminine. If it ends in a hard consonant and doesn't denote a woman (which would automatically make it indeclinable), it's doomed to be masculine. If the noun ends in /-e/ or /-o/ and isn't indeclinable, it's neuter (that's a closed group, if we exclude certain kinds of nominalizations, of course). So the question may arise only if:
1) the noun ends in a soft consonant, or
2) the noun is indeclinable for some reason (it happens with some foreign names and loanwords ending in /-a/, and with all such words which end in other vowels; mind you, native Russian words in their nominative singular form don't end in vowels other than /-a/, /-e/ or /-o/).

The first case is really difficult, and most of the time it's easier to look into the dictionary. Most Russian river names (f. reká) ending in soft consonants are feminine, and so are French provinces ending in -gne (f. províntsiya; cf. also f. straná, f. zemlyá), but with cities it really depends; it seems that even Russian academic sources cannot agree upon the gender of Polish Łódź (Rus. Lodz'), for example.

The second case demonstrates a somewhat stronger correlation between the gender of the word and the gender of the generic noun, but there is still a large room for uncertainty.

As for general correlations, I doubt they are strong. Among the days (m. den') of week, three are masculine, three are feminine and one (Sunday - "voskresénye", i.e. "resurrection") is neuter. Months (m. mésyats) are all masculine. Color names are simply adjectives (and, unsurprisingly, in the masculine form, since the deletion of m. "tsvet" - "color" - is presupposed), although nouns like "redness", when they exist, are feminine, formed with various morphological complexes (/-otá/, /-izná/, /-'/, /-evá/). With numbers everything is complex, but, for certain, all kinds of derived nouns are feminine, unlike the word "number" (n. "chisló"). Names for the letters (f. búkva) are feminine or neuter (colloquial language apparently prefers the latter variant).


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## volo

A little strange, if you think about it, the saying Kiev looks like is the mother of Russian cities.
_Киев есть *мать* городов русских _(?)
After all, the word city is masculine.


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## lingpil

Dymn said:


> Oops, I should've checked first. Thanks for the correction!



Basically there are two categories of masculine river names in German: 1) German rivers with names of Celtic etymology (der Rhein, der Main, der Neckar) and 2) basically any river outside of Germany, with the exception of French and Russian river names that are feminine in their original language (die Loire, die Seine, die Rhône, die Wolga, die Kama, die Lena). Die Themse is probably feminine because the German name is treated here in the same way as names for rivers in Germany itself.


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## Yendred

lingpil said:


> river names that are feminine in their original language (die Loire, die Seine, die Rhône



*La*_ Loire, *la* Seine_ but *le*_ Rhône_ 😉


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## lingpil

Here it's a case of "Systemzwang". The "-e" ending of Rhône has been lumped together with all the feminine "-e" endings. Actually I wasn't myself aware that Rhône is masculine in French. Thanks for pointing that out!


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## Yendred

After some investigation, in French, it seems there are no more rule about river names gender than for any other noun.

Rivers that were known by Romans tend to have kept the same gender as in Latin, but there are exceptions:
_*La *Seine_ (_Sequana_, *f*)
_*Le *Rhône_ (_Rhodanus_, *m*)
_*La *Garonne _(_Garumna_, *f*)
*Le *_Rhin _(_Rhenus_, *m*)
but:
_*La *Loire_ (_Liger_, *m*)

Faraway rivers tend to be masculine: _*le *Nil, *le *Congo, *le *Jourdain, *le *Gange_, ...
but the _-a_ ending tend to feminize them (_*la *Volga, *la *Moskova_), except with _*le *Niagara._

And so on, and so forth, rules contradicted by exceptions...


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## Yendred

Dymn said:


> You can add more categories if you find new ones.



What about:
Languages: _*la *langue - *le *français, *le *russe, *le *japonais _(f - m)

What about in other... languages?


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## Awwal12

Yendred said:


> What about:
> Languages: _*la *langue - *le *français, *le *russe, *le *japonais _(f - m)
> 
> What about in other... languages?


Again, in Russian the names of languages are relative adjectives, and since язык (yazýk - language, tongue) is masculine, they have masculine forms: frantsúzskiy (yazýk), rússkiy (yazýk), yapónskiy (yazýk), etc.


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## Olaszinhok

Awwal12 said:


> Again, in Russian the names of languages are relative adjectives, and since язык (yazýk - language, tongue) is masculine, they have masculine forms: frantsúzskiy (yazýk), rússkiy (yazýk), yapónskiy (yazýk), etc.


I am wondering whether there is an Indo-European Language in which the names of languages are feminine...


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## Perseas

Olaszinhok said:


> I am wondering whether there is an Indo-European Language in which the names of languages are feminine...


In Greek they are.
Η γλώσσα (The language) --> feminine
H ελληνική γλώσσα (The Greek language) --> Here ελληνική is an adjective.
Η Ελληνική, η Ιταλική, η Γερμανική, η Γαλλική, η Ισπανική, η Αγγλική etc.  Or lowercase, according to other grammarians: Η ελληνική, η ιταλική, η γερμανική, η γαλλική, η ισπανική, η αγγλική etc. --> : Here the languages are considered nouns (nominalized adjectives).

But it's very common to use the neuter plural: τα Ελληνικά/ελληνικά.


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## Olaszinhok

Perseas said:


> In Greek they are.
> Η γλώσσα (The language) --> feminine


In the Romance languages as well,  in Italian _lingua_ is feminine and also _la lingua italiana, _but the name of the languages are all masculine:_ l'italiano, lo spagnolo, il francese, il tedesco _(Italian, Spanish, French, German). It seems to me that in Greek and in the Slavic Languages adjectives are used to name the languages.


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## Awwal12

Well, since they may appear as the only overt element in a noun group, they may be considered nominalized in those situations, but even then they retain the adjectival declension paradigm, so the connection remains rather strong, and there is no reason for unmotivated changes of gender.


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## AndrasBP

Olaszinhok said:


> I am wondering whether there is an Indo-European Language in which the names of languages are feminine...


In Czech, Slovak and Slovenian there is a feminine suffix to form the names of languages, e.g. "the Italian language" is:
italština (cz)
taliančina (sk)
italijanščina (slo)


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## Dymn

Yendred said:


> What about:
> Languages: _*la *langue - *le *français, *le *russe, *le *japonais _(f - m)
> 
> What about in other... languages?


They are masculine in Catalan and Spanish too but the gender of "language" can be either: _llengua/lengua_ (f), _idioma _(m).



Olaszinhok said:


> I am wondering whether there is an Indo-European Language in which the names of languages are feminine...


In Romanian they are: _română, maghiară, greacă, italiană, etc._



Olaszinhok said:


> It seems to me that in Greek and in the Slavic Languages adjectives are used to name the languages.


Well I'd say they are nominalized adjectives in Romance languages as well, the difference is we don't have separate "declensions" for nouns and adjectives.


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## Olaszinhok

AndrasBP said:


> In Czech, Slovak and Slovenian there is a feminine suffix to form the names of languages, e.g. "the Italian language" is:
> italština (cz)
> taliančina (sk)
> italijanščina (slo)



 Thank you, I should've said in Russian...



Dymn said:


> In Romanian they are: _română, maghiară, greacă, italiană, etc._


Thank you, I did know that...


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## apmoy70

Perseas said:


> ...
> But it's very common to use the neuter plural: τα Ελληνικά/ελληνικά.


That's because it used to modify as an adjective the neuter plural _γράμματα_ --> _letters_ so, it was «τὰ ἑλληνικὰ γράμματα» and as a nominalized adj. used widely in Koine «τὰ ἑλληνικά»


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## nimak

*Macedonian*

Numbers:
*број* (broj) _m_.
When counting, in general, numbers are _masculine_. But they have _feminine _and _neuter _forms too.

Months:
*месец* (mesec) _m_.
Months are considered _masculine_, except for March "Март" which in the folklore and the poetry sometimes is called "Марта" which is _feminine_.

Weekdays:
*ден* (den) _m_.
Four of them are _masculine_, and three of them are _feminine _(среда, сабота, недела _(Wednesday, Saturday, Sunday)_).

Colours:
*боја* (boja) _f_.
Colour names are adjectives. In their general use they are usually used in their _feminine_ form, but they have _masculine _and _neuter _forms too.

Letters:
*буква* (bukva) _f_.
The letters have no "names", the individual letters are pronounced like M /mə/, K /kə/ etc. To say "The letter M" it would be "Буквата М" ['bukvata 'mə]. If you skip the word "letter" (буква) then you can say "М-то" /'mə.tᴐ/ - "The M", where "-то" ("-to") is a _neuter_ gender definite suffixed article.

Rivers:
*река* (reka) _f_.
Rivers usually have names of _feminine _and _masculine _gender, rarely _neuter_. Темза (Temza, "_Thames_") _f._; Нил (Nil, "_Nile_") _m_.

Planets
*планета* (planeta) _f_.
Planet names are in all three genders. "Јупитер _(m.)_ е најголемата _(adj. f.)_ планета _(f.)_." - "Jupiter is the largest planet.".


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## Yendred

nimak said:


> Months are considered _masculine_, except for March "Март" which in poetry sometimes is called "Марта" which is _feminine_.



How odd, as March is a reference to Mars, god of War, and as such the archetypical male character.


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## jazyk

In Portuguese:

Numbers: o número - o três (m - m)
Months: o mês - dezembro (m - m)
Weekdays: o dia da semana - o domingo (m - m), but days ending in feira are feminine: segunda-feira, Monday, for example
Colours: a cor - o vermelho (f - m)
Letters: a letra - o eme (f - m) 
Rivers: o rio - o Danúbio (m - m)
Planets: o planeta - Marte (m - m)


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## Awwal12

Yendred said:


> How odd, as March is a reference to Mars, god of War, and as such the archetypical male character.


I believe March must be the most characteristic spring month in Macedonia, so here we have a bit of poetic affection.


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## Yendred

jazyk said:


> Colours: a cor - o vermelho (f - m)



We seem to have the same oddity in Portuguese and in French:
_a cor _is feminine, but colour names are masculine (_o laranja_) even if they come from a feminine noun (_a laranja_). Am I wrong?


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## nimak

@Yendred & @Awwal12  I meant to say in the _"folklore and poetry"_.

Because of the unpredictable and changeable weather during the month of March, this month (Март, Марта) in the Macedonian folklore is presented as a very unpredictable, deceptive, odd, crazy old woman - Marta. There are many tales and proverbs about March (Mart, Marta).


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## Yendred

Our discussions about gender of nouns must appear far-fetched to English natives


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## jazyk

Yendred said:


> We seem to have the same oddity in Portuguese and in French:
> _a cor _is feminine, but colour names are masculine (_o laranja_) even if they come from a feminine noun (_a laranja_). Am I wrong?


You are not.


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## Yendred




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## Red Arrow

Dymn said:


> But it's not in German:
> 
> Numbers: _die Zahl - die Drei _(f - f)
> Months: _der Monat - der Dezember _(m - m)
> Weekdays: _der Wochentag - der Sonntag_ (m - m)
> Colours: _die Farbe - das Rot _(f - n)
> Letters:_ der Buchstabe - das M_ (m - n)
> Rivers:_ der Fluss - die Donau _(m - f)*
> Planets: _der Planet - der Mars _(m - m)*


*Dutch* differs from German:
Numbers: het nummer / het getal, de drie (n - f)
Months: de maand, december (f - (m))
Weekdays: de weekdag, de zondag (m - m)
Colours: de kleur, het rood (f - n)
Letters: de letter, de M (f - f)
Rivers: de rivier, de Donau (f - m/f/(n))
Planets: de planeet, Mars (f - (m/f))

Please note that masculine and feminine are often merged into "common" gender.

Most rivers have common gender. Only 7 rivers are neuter. (and I hadn't heard of any of them)

You can't put an article before "december" or "Mars", but apparently all months are masculine. Earth is "de Aarde" (f), the other names of the planets are based on Roman mythology.

Another interesting one: *trees and their fruits*.

Trees: de boom, de eik (m - m)
Fruits: de vrucht / het fruit, de appel (f/n - f)

All native trees are masculine besides "de linde" (f)!


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## Yendred

French:

Trees: _un arbre - un chêne, un bouleau_ (m - m) (*)
Fruits: _un fruit - un abricot, une banane _(m - m/f)

(*) There are very few and rare exceptions of feminine tree nouns. I didn't even know them or know they were considered as trees. For those interested in it, read this:
Le genre des noms de l'arbre


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## Awwal12

Trees (neuter "dérevo") are predominantly feminine or masculine in Russian. Fruits (m. plod, m. frukt) are pretty random (n. yábloko "apple", f. grúsha "pear", m. abrikós "aprikot"); most are loanwords anyway (Central Russia hardly can be called a land of fruits).


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## Dymn

Red Arrow said:


> Another interesting one: *trees and their fruits*.


I remember a thread specifically about the gender of trees, but I can't find it right now.

Anyway,

In Catalan:

*Trees* (_arbre (m)_) - most are masculine, but you can find some feminine too: _palmera _("palm tree"), _alzina _("holm oak"), _olivera _("olive tree"), _perera _("pear tree")
*Fruits *(_fruit _(m); also _fruita _(f) if edible) - no rule or tendency whatsoever, out of the examples you have mentioned, two are feminine, two are masculine: _poma _("apple", f), _pera _("pear", f), _plàtan _("banana", m), _albercoc _("apricot", m)

Spanish: the same but just with different examples


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## Sardokan1.0

*Sardinian :*

Numbers: _su numeru - su tres _(m - m)
Months: _su mese - Nadale _(m - m)
Weekdays: _su die de sa chida - sa domínica/domíniga_ (m - f)
Colours: _su colore - su ruju _(m - m)
Letters:_ sa littera - sa emme_ (f - f)
Rivers:_ su rivu/riu- su Danubiu _(m - m)
Planets: _su pianeta - Marte_ (m - m) 

*Trees* (_àrvure (f.) it's feminine like in Latin_) - : _pramma _( f. "palm tree") , _èlighe / ùlumu_ ( m. "holm oak"), _àrvure de olía_ ( f. "olive tree"), _àrvure de pira _( f. "pear tree")
*Fruits *(_fruttu _(m); also _frùtture _(f. uncountable) )- : _mela _("apple", f.), _pira _("pear", f.), _banana _("banana", f.), _barracocco, paracocco, piricoccu_ ("apricot", m)


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## Dymn

Sardokan1.0 said:


> Weekdays: _su die de sa chida - sa domínica/domíniga_ (m - f)


What about other days of the week in Sardinian? I've seen _domenica _is also feminine in Italian but other days are masculine.


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## Yendred

Dymn said:


> I've seen _domenica _is also feminine in Italian but other days are masculine



It is because _domenica _is the day of rest after six days of work....


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## Olaszinhok

Yendred said:


> It is because _domenica _is the day of rest after six days of work....



Also summer, *estate (f*) which is something profoundly feminine in my mind, is masculine in the main Romance Languages* été, verano verão, estiu…*
As regards the others seasons* stagione (f)  primavera (f) estate (f) autunno (m) inverno (m)*


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## Yendred

French:

Seasons: *une *_saison _*- un *_printemps, *un *été, *un *automne, *un *hiver _(f - m/m/m/m)


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## Awwal12

In Russian, seasons (n.pl. vremená góda - lit. "times of year") are all feminine except summer (léto), which is neuter.


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## Welsh_Sion

In Welsh, all the languages are feminine, including the word for language ('iaith') itself. The usually, but not exclusively end in -eg (cf. Breton, where the often end in -ek).

BUT … in Welsh, if they are modified by an adjective, then they behave like Masculine nouns.

Cymraeg (n.f.) - Welsh

BUT …

Cymraeg da - Good Welsh

(i.e. NO Soft Mutation as would be expected - Whereas, *Cymraeg dda is wrong).

Again, the form:

yn Gymraeg = in Welsh

With the unexpected SOFT Mutation after 'yn' ( = in) is actually because it's actually an understood 'yn y Gymraeg'. (Similarly, we often say 'yn tân' = in the fire' when correctly, we should say 'yn y tân')

Again, yn + Nasal Mutation occurs if the language term is modified. So,

*yng Nghymraeg is wrong (or much older Welsh)

But,

yng Nghymraeg y Beibl = in Bible Welsh
yng Nghymraeg William Morgan = in William Morgan's Welsh

are both correct.


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## Welsh_Sion

Yendred,

But don't you distinguish the following?

au printemps
BUT
en ete/automne/hiver


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## Welsh_Sion

Also throw you this whilst we're on the subject of genders and sets:

a piece of furniture = Welsh: dodrefnyn (n.f.)

a chair = Welsh: cadair (n.f.)
a table = Southern Welsh: bord (n.f.); Northern Welsh: bwrdd (n.m.)
a wardrobe = Welsh: (g)wardrob (n.f.); cwpwrdd dillad (n.m.)
a bed = Welsh: gwely (n.f.)
an ottoman = Welsh: otoman (n.m.f.)


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## nimak

In Macedonian it is similar/same with Russian for:

Languages: m. - m.
*јазик* (jazik) _m_.
Language names are adjectives, and they follow the noun's gender, so they are _masculine_ too: македонски (makédonski), руски (rúski), англиски (ángliski), француски (frántsuski) etc.

Seasons: n. - f. n. f. f.
*годишно време* (gódishno vréme) _neuter_, lit. "year's time"; *годишни времиња* (gódishni vréminja) _n. pl_.
пролет (prólet) _f_. "_Spring_"; лето (léto) _n_. "_Summer_"; есен (ésen) _f_. "_Autumn_"; зима (zíma) _f_. "_Winter_"

And here there are exceptions of the "general" rule. Even though _prólet_ and _ésen_ end on consonant, their gender is still _feminine _and not _masculine_.


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## Sardokan1.0

Dymn said:


> What about other days of the week in Sardinian? I've seen _domenica _is also feminine in Italian but other days are masculine.



_*Lùnis *_- masculine
_*Màrtis *_- m.
_*Mèrcuris *_- m.
_*Jòvia, Jòbia, Jòia*_ - feminine
_*Chenàpura *_- f.
_*Sàppadu *_- m.
_*Domínica, Domíniga* - _f.

The seasons instead are all masculine

*Hierru *_- Winter
*Beránu *- Spring
*Istíu *- Summer
*Attunzu *- Autumn_


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## Yendred

Welsh_Sion said:


> But don't you distinguish the following?
> 
> au printemps
> BUT
> en ete/automne/hiver



The rule is the same for country names and season names:
- Masculine names starting with a consonant are preceded by "_au_".
- Feminine names, and masculine names starting with a vowel are preceded by "_en_".

_au printemps _(m, starting with a consonant)
_en été _(m, starting with a vowel)
_en automne _(m, starting with a vowel)
_en hiver _(m, starting with a vowel, the '_h_' being considered silent)


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## Olaszinhok

Sardokan1.0 said:


> *Beránu *- Spring


This is curious, beranu means spring in Sardinian, while verano/ verão means summer in Spanish and Portuguese.


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## Sardokan1.0

Olaszinhok said:


> This is curious, beranu is spring in Sardinian, while verano/ verão is summer in Spanish and Portuguese.



Also in Corsican language there is Veranu = spring

It's derived from the Latin adjective Veranus.

Ver-veris = spring
Veranus = adjective "of the spring"
Tempus Veranus = spring time


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## Perseas

In Greek, the "season" ("εποχή") is  feminine, but the four seasons are of all three genders:
Χειμώνας (Winter) m., Άνοιξη (spring) f., Καλοκαίρι (summer) n., Φθινόπωρο (autumn) n.

The "tree" (δέντρο") is neuter, but fruit trees and flowers are usually feminine, like πορτοκαλιά (orange tree), μηλιά (apple tree), etc.

The "wind" ("άνεμος") is masculine, and the names of the winds are masculine too:
βοριάς (north wind), νοτιάς (south wind), λεβάντες (east wind),  πουνέντες (west wind), μαΐστρος (northwest wind), σιρόκος (northeast wind), etc.


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## Yendred

For those who understand Spanish, this article explains why "_ver_" root may mean _spring _in some languages, and _summer _in others:
Etimología de VERANO


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## Red Arrow

In Dutch, all languages are neuter, but in Swedish, they are all common.


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