Portuguese Grammar - Adjectives

Adjectives

Adjectives normally follow the nouns which they modify. Thus "white house" is casa branca but the reverse order branca casa is possible. Some adjectives like bom ("good"), belo ("nice"), and grande ("great", "big") are often prefixed. Indeed, some of these have rather different meanings depending on position: um grande homem means "a great man", um homem grande means "a big man".

They are inflected for gender and number, and have also a "superlative" inflection, which actually enhances the meaning of the adjective without explicitly comparing it ("lindo", beautiful; "lindíssimo", very beautiful). The actual degrees of comparison are expressed analytically, mostly with the adverb mais "more": mais alto (do) que = "higher than", o mais alto "the highest". However, a few other adjectives (besides mais itself) have suppletive comparative/superlative forms:

Adjective	Comparative	Superlative (absolut)	Superlative (relative)
bom (good)	melhor (better)	o melhor (the best)	ótimo (very good)
mau (bad)	pior (worse)	o pior (the worst)	péssimo (very bad)
pequeno (small)	menor (smaller)	o menor (the smallest)	mínimo (very small)
grande (big)	maior (bigger)	o maior (the biggest)	máximo (very big)

The others adjectives follow this example:

Adjective	Comparative	Superlative (absolut)	Superlative (relative)
belo (pretty)	mais belo (prettier)	o mais belo (the prettiest)	belíssimo (very pretty)
caro (expensive)	mais caro (more expensive)	o mais caro (the most expensive)	caríssimo (very expensive)

The rules for inflecting adjectives for gender and number are the same as those for nouns. There are a few basic patterns, including:

(masc.singl., fem.singl., masc.pl., fem.pl.):

branco, branca, brancos, brancas ("white")

francês, francesa, franceses, francesas ("French")

verde, verde, verdes, verdes ("green")

feliz, feliz, felizes, felizes ("happy")

superior, superior, superiores, superiores ("superior")

motor, motriz, motores, motrizes ("motorised")

azul, azul, azuis, azuis ("blue")

grandão, grandona, grandões, grandonas ("rather big")

However, there are a few exceptions, such as:

bom, boa, bons, boas ("good")

lilás, lilás, lilás, lilás ("lilac")