Purpose

By the end of this lesson, you will be able to correctly agree Russian adjectives in gender and number with the nouns they describe.

Lesson Explanation

Russian adjectives must agree with the noun they describe in gender and number, mirroring the gender rules from Part 1, Lesson 4 but with their own distinct endings. The standard masculine ending is -ый or -ой (depending on stress): новый (new). The feminine ending is -ая: новая. The neuter ending is -ое: новое. The plural ending, used for all genders: -ые: новые.

A genuinely important spelling rule affecting many common adjectives: after the consonants г, к, х, ж, ч, ш, щ, the masculine ending -ый changes to -ий, and feminine/neuter/plural -ая/-ое/-ые shift their vowel to -ая/-ее/-ие in some further cases — the immediately relevant version here: хороший (good, masc.), хорошая (good, fem.), хорошее (good, neut.), хорошие (good, plural).

Unlike Spanish, Italian, or French, Russian descriptive adjectives virtually always precede the noun, with no equivalent flexibility: новый дом (a new house) — never “дом новый” as a neutral, unmarked word order, though placing the adjective after the noun for stylistic emphasis is possible in more literary or poetic registers.

This gender/number agreement is only the beginning of Russian adjective behavior — adjectives also change according to case, a system that compounds directly with the noun case system introduced starting in the next Part, and covered together with nouns throughout Parts 2-3.

Practice Questions