Introduction

English has a large class of adjectives which can express a variety of meanings: classification, description, evaluation and many other ideas. Most European languages, and many others, have similar classes of adjectives. Some of the world’s languages, however, have few if any adjectives. In such languages the relevant ideas might be expressed by using nouns or verbs; so the equivalent of, for example, She’s angry could be something corresponding to ‘She has anger’ or ‘She rages’.

English adjectives are relatively easy to use, since (except for comparatives and superlatives, Comparison) an adjective can only have one possible form. There are some complications of position and word order: these and a few other points are covered in the following entries.

Do you know what’s wrong with these, and why?

He lives in a palace grand. (see here)

She’s three years elder than me. (see here)

an asleep baby (see here)

It’s a political old idea. (see here)

Look at the green beautiful mountains. (see here)

an attractive, traditional, woollen dress (see here)

an angry and young man (see here)

After two days crossing the foothills, they reached the proper mountain. (see here)

The tree is high thirty feet. (see here)

They’re advertising for skilled in design people. (see here)

It’s a difficult to solve problem. (see here)

I like your so beautiful country. (see here)

The most important is to be happy. (see here)

The blind next door is getting a new job. (see here)

This government isn’t interested in the poor’s problems. (see here)

My sister’s marrying a Welsh. (see here)