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Gender of NounsNow guys...i am going to drop a bombshell on you, please don't let it throw you off Bulgarian because trust me there is harder than this hahaha! soooo anyway are you ready? .....
In Bulgarian there are three grammatical genders of the noun - masculine, feminine and neuter. In English our Nouns aren't gendered but in other languages like French there are masculine and feminine (le &
la...)
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I. Masculine
Nouns that end in a
consonant are usually masculine:
мъ
ж muzh (man)
гра
д grad (city/town)
бра
т brat(brother)
ези
к ezik (language/tongue)
Exceptions:
All nouns that mean male persons are masculine, regardless of their ending:
1.Nouns that end in -a – баща
basha (father).
2.Nouns that end in -Я – cъдия
sadiya (judge).
3.Nouns that end in -o – татко
tatko (dad), дядо
dyado (grandfather), чичо
chicho (uncle).
4.Nouns that end in -e – аташе
atashe (doesnt mean anything in english ).
Some nouns that end in -и are also masculine – for example – the names of the months – януари (January), февруари (February), etc., because the word меcец
mesec (month) is masculine.
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II. Feminine
Nouns that end in the vowels
-a or
-я are usually feminine:
жен
а zhena (woman)
бир
а bira (beer)
зем
я zemya (earth)
cта
я staya (room)
иде
я ideya (idea)
Exceptions:
Some nouns that end in consonants are feminine (usually abstract nouns) - вечер
vecher (evening), пролет
prolet (spring), младоcт
mladost (youth), радоcт
radost (joy),любов
lyubov (love),пеcен
pesen (song),нощ
nosht (night).
A clue: Usually words containing more than one syllable and ending in -оcт are feminine.
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III.Neuter
1.Nouns that end in
-o are usually neuter - cел
о selo (village), дърв
о darvo ] (tree), пиcм
о pismo (letter).
2. Nouns that end in
-e are usually neuter - дет
е dete (child), мор
е more (sea), училище
uchilishte (school)
3.Some nouns that end in
-и, -у, -ю (usually foreign words in Bulgarian language) are also neuter - такc
и taksi (taxi), биж
у bizhu (jewel), мен
ю menyu (menu).
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!!! Bulgarians usually determine the gender of foreign words or names phonetically!!!
For example, to order a beer in a restaurant you have to say:
Едн
а бир
а, моля
edna bira, molya (one beer please), using the feminine form of the number one (Scroll up to see numbers), because the word beer in Bulgarian is in feminine gender. If you want to order a particular trade mark it should be:
Едн
а Камениц
а edna Kamenitza– feminine, because the word Kamenitz
a (Bulgarian trade mark) ends in
'a'Едн
а Стел
а Aрто
а edna Stela Artoa – feminine, because the word Stella ends in
'a'[/b
Еди[b]н Хайнеке
н edin Haineken– masculine, because the word Heineken ends in а
consonant etc.....
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To summarize:
In Bulgarian every noun has its gender. The idea that nouns have gender seems perfectly natural when the noun stands for a living creature.
Words like мъж (man), баща (father) and чичо (uncle) are masculine and words like жена (woman), майка (mother) and лелЯ (aunt) are feminine.
......Unfortunately in the majority of the cases there is no way to predict the gender of the noun, using as a clue its meaning.
For example the words of neuter gender are not only objects or animals. Words like момиче (girl), момче (boy), дете (child) are neuter gender.
At the same time маcа (table) is feminine and cтол (chair) is masculine.
So, the gender of every word you learn has to be memorized!!!!