Sentence Structure
So you know a lot of words, you know what they mean, you've even got some verb conjugation down. Now what? How do you fit all of those puzzle pieces together? This grammar guide entry is designed to help you identify patterns in Italian sentence structure, and to give you the tools to construct your own sentences in Italian. First we'll begin with simple declarative sentences. These are generally comprised of a subject, a verb and an object.
In English a sentence might look like this: I take the book. In Italian we can often omit the personal pronoun, in this case I. The result is: (Io) prendo il libro. The order is the same as in English: subject, then verb, and finally object.
Other examples are:
Pietro sta guardando la TV. Pietro is watching TV.
(Tu) Hai il mio numero. You have my number.
(Noi) Abbiamo visto il film. We have seen the film.
Now to complicate things a little, let's say we want to negate a sentence. The action being described is not being performed. As you know, to negate a verb in Italian, we use the word non. But where is the right place to put it, you might ask?
Non precedes the verb being negated. Let's take that first sentence above for example:
(Io) prendo il libro. ----> (Io) Non prendo il libro.
Notice that if the personal pronoun is being used, then the adverb of negation, the non follows it, but comes before the verb.
Let's explore with the other sentences listed above:
Pietro sta guardando la TV. Pietro is watching the TV.
Pietro non sta guardando la TV. Pietro is not watching the TV.
(Tu) Hai il mio numero. You have my number.
Non hai il mio numero. You don't have my number.
(Noi) Abbiamo visto il film. We have seen the film.
Noi non abbiamo visto il film. We haven't seen the film.
We'll be talking about constructing questions and more complicated sentences in later grammar guide entries.
In English a sentence might look like this: I take the book. In Italian we can often omit the personal pronoun, in this case I. The result is: (Io) prendo il libro. The order is the same as in English: subject, then verb, and finally object.
Other examples are:
Pietro sta guardando la TV. Pietro is watching TV.
(Tu) Hai il mio numero. You have my number.
(Noi) Abbiamo visto il film. We have seen the film.
Now to complicate things a little, let's say we want to negate a sentence. The action being described is not being performed. As you know, to negate a verb in Italian, we use the word non. But where is the right place to put it, you might ask?
Non precedes the verb being negated. Let's take that first sentence above for example:
(Io) prendo il libro. ----> (Io) Non prendo il libro.
Notice that if the personal pronoun is being used, then the adverb of negation, the non follows it, but comes before the verb.
Let's explore with the other sentences listed above:
Pietro sta guardando la TV. Pietro is watching the TV.
Pietro non sta guardando la TV. Pietro is not watching the TV.
(Tu) Hai il mio numero. You have my number.
Non hai il mio numero. You don't have my number.
(Noi) Abbiamo visto il film. We have seen the film.
Noi non abbiamo visto il film. We haven't seen the film.
We'll be talking about constructing questions and more complicated sentences in later grammar guide entries.
