Page:A simplified grammar of the Roumanian language.djvu/24

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12
ROUMANIAN GRAMMAR.

The Masculine Article.

The masculine nouns endings with a consonant take the article l preceded by u; thus:

om, ‘man;’ om-u-l, ‘the man.’
cal, ‘horse;’ cal-u-l, ‘the horse.’
tun, ‘cannon;’ tun-u-l, ‘the cannon.’
tălhar, ‘thief;’ tălhar-u-l, ‘the thief.’
pĕr, ‘hair;’ pĕr-u-l, ‘the hair.’

It is easy to see that in these words the vowel u is interpolated for the sake of euphony; for it is disagreeable to the ear of a Roumanian to pronounce oml, tunl, focl, pĕrl, tălharl, as in the English words ‘people,’ ‘little,’ ‘nimble.’

When a masculine noun ends with u there is no occasion to insert another u, and so the definite noun will be—

socru, ‘father-in-law;’ socru-l, ‘the father-in-law.’
leŭ, ‘lion;’ leu-l, ‘the lion.’

The masculine nouns ending with e take the article le:

rege, ‘king;’ rege-le, ‘the king.’
frate, ‘brother;’ frate-le, ‘the brother.’
munte, ‘mountain;’ munte-le, ‘the mountain.’

Those ending in ĭ follow the rule of those ending with a consonant:

usturoĭ, ‘onion;’ usturoi-u-l, ‘the onion.’
ciocoĭ, ‘parvenu;’ ciocoi-u-l, ‘the parvenu.’

Those ending in ă change the ă to a, following the analogy of feminine nouns:

ta, ‘father;’ tata, ‘the father.’
po, ‘priest;’ popa, ‘the priest.’