Not all languages have adjectives, but most, including English, do. (English adjectives include big, old, and tired, among many others.) Those that do not, typically use words of another part of speech, often verbs, to serve the same semantic function; for example, such a language might have a verb that means "to be big", and would use a construction analogous to "big-being house" to express what English expresses as "big house". Even in languages that do have adjectives, one language's adjective might not be another's; for example, while English uses "to be hungry" (hungry being an adjective).
In many
languages, attributive adjectives usually occur in a specific order. The
adjective order in English is generally;
- opinion
- size
- age
- shape
- color
- origin
- material
- purpose
So, in
English, adjectives pertaining to size precede adjectives pertaining to age
("little old", not "old little"), which in turn generally
precede adjectives pertaining to color ("old white", not "white
old"). So, we would say "A nice (opinion) little (size) old (age)
white (color) brick (material) house". However, some native speakers will
say, "a big, ugly desk" (size, opinion) instead of "an ugly, big
desk" (opinion, size).
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