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

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:

tată,	‘father;’	tata,	‘the father.’
popă,	‘priest;’	popa,	‘the priest.’