Multilingual articles (indefinite)

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Here you can see an overview to indefinite articles in many different languages. Feel free to add more.

Indefinite plural articles only seem to exist in some Romance languages. Compare French un livre / des livres to English a book / books.

Contents

Albanian

The is no indefinite article in the plural. The only indefinite article is një.

Arabic

There is no indefinite article, in formal pronunciation and full vocalized writings indefinite is shown by tanwin, if not in a "constuct state".

In writing (normal of full vocalized) the tanwin of accusative indefinite is shown by a final alif, which is not pronounced. (The alif is not used if the word ends in ta marbuta or alif with a hamza). So:
he opened the door: �?تح الباب
he opened a door: �?تح بابا

Bashkir

There are no indefinite articles whatsoever.

Breton

  • ul before a word begining by l.
  • un before a word begining by t, d, n, a vowel or a mute h.
  • ur before a word begining by other consonants.

Catalan

  • feminine singular: una
  • feminine plural: unes
  • masculine singular: un
  • masculine plural: unes

Dalecarlian

There is no indefinite article in the plural, and there is no genitive.

  • masculine: nom. ein, acc. ein, dat. einum,
  • feminine: nom. eiñ, acc. eina, dat. einnir,
  • neuter: nom. eit, acc. eit, dat. einu.

Dutch

There is no indefinite article in the plural. The only indefinite article in Dutch is een.

English

There is no indefinite article in the plural.

  • before a consonant (excluding "h"): a
  • before vowels and the letter "h": an

Note that the sound when spoken, rather than the printed letter, governs the usage of "a"/"an". You would say "a federal agent" as expected, but "an FBI agent" because the F in "FBI" is spoken "ef".

Esperanto

There is no indefinite article in Esperanto

Faroese

There is no indefinite article in plural.

  • feminine singular: nom. ein, gen. einar, dat. ein(ar)i, acc. eina
  • feminine plural: nom. einar, gen. eina, dat. einum, acc. einar
  • masculine singular: nom. ein, gen. eins, dat. einum, acc. ein
  • masculine plural: nom. einir, gen. eina, dat. einum, acc. einar
  • neuter singular: nom. eitt, gen. eins, dat. einum, acc. eitt
  • neuter plural: nom. eini, gen. eina, dat. einum, acc. eini

French

  • feminine singular: une
  • masculine singular: un
  • plural: des

Galician

  • feminine singular: unha
  • masculine singular: un
  • feminine plural: unhas
  • masculine plural: uns

German

There is no indefinite article in the plural.

  • feminine: nom. eine, gen. einer, dat. einer, acc. eine
  • masculine: nom. ein, gen. eines, dat. einem, acc. einen
  • neuter: nom. ein, gen. eines, dat. einem, acc. ein

Greek

There is no indefinite article in the plural.

  • feminine: nom. μια, gen. μιας, acc. μια
  • masculine: nom. ένας, gen. ενός, acc. ένα(ν)
  • neuter: nom. ένα, gen. ενός, acc. ένα

The �? in brackets (accusative masculine) is dropped if the following word starts with Β, Γ, Δ, Ζ, Θ, Λ, Μ, �?, Ρ, Φ or Χ.

See also Greek grammar: Articles

Hungarian

There is no indefinite article in the plural. The only indefinite article in Hungarian is egy.

Hebrew

There are no indefinite articles.

Irish

There are no indefinite articles.

Italian

There is no indefinite article in the plural.

  • feminine: una, before a vowel un'
  • masculine:
        un before consonants (but the followings) and vowels 
        uno before z, x, ps, gn, or s impura (s followed by another consonant).
 Be aware: un'amica, un'artista (feminine)
           un amico, un aritista (masculine) 


Kazakh

There are no indefinite articles whatsoever.

Kirghiz

There are no indefinite articles whatsoever.

Luxembourgish

There is no indefinite article in the plural.

  • feminine: nominative/accusative eng, dative enger
  • masculine/neuter: nominative/accusative e(n), dative engem

The consonant in brackets is dropped if the following letter is not D, H, N, T, Z, a vowel or a punctuation mark.

I'm afraid I'm not 100% sure about those articles...

Norwegian

  • feminine: ei
  • masculine: en
  • neuter: et

There is no plural indefinite article. See Norwegian articles for details.

Portuguese

  • feminine: singular uma, plural umas
  • masculine: singular um, plural uns

Romanian

  • feminine: nom/acc o, gen/dat unei
  • masculine/neuter: nom/acc un, gen/dat unui

Russian

There are no indefinite articles whatsoever.

Spanish

  • feminine: singular una, plural unas
  • masculine: singular un, plural unos

Scots-Gaelic

There are no indefinite articles in Scots-Gaelic.

Swedish

  • uter singular: en,
  • neuter singular: ett,
  • plural: (ena).

Tatar

There are no indefinite articles whatsoever.

Turkish

There are no indefinite articles whatsoever.


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