Overview

Before we start studying the Catalan language we must talk a little about its dialects. This is so because we will be based on the central (Barcelona) dialect, and it is important to be aware of the important differences existing between it and the other varieties of the language.

The central dialect is spoken by a majority of the population, and although it can in turn be divided into subdialects, it is remarkably homogeneous in vocabulary, verb patterns, pronunciation, and morphology. The other dialects have less speakers, and are also less uniform. Catalan has numerous lateral areas, i.e., regions where the language has evolved differently than in the main cities, retaining many archaic words and structures and developing original grammatical features. However, few speakers are located in these regions.

Catalan has two main dialectal blocs:

Eastern Catalan:
Central Catalan: spoken in the Spanish provinces of Barcelona, Girona, and NE Tarragona.
Balearic: spoken on the Balearic Islands.
Roussillonese: spoken in the French department of the Pyrenées Orientaux.
Western Catalan:
North-Western Catalan: spoken in the provinces of Lleida and SW Tarragona.
Valencian: spoken in the provinces of Castelló, València and Alacant.

The pie-chart, above, shows the approximate distribution of the speakers according to their mother dialect. As can be seen, the Central dialect has more speakers than the other five grouped together. Next in importance is Valencian, and then come the North-Western dialect and Balearic with roughly the same number of speakers. Roussillonese, spoken in a lateral area, marks the presence of the Catalan language in the French state, but is not important from a numerical viewpoint.

The main differences between the dialects are in pronunciation, vocabulary, verb conjugation, and the morphology of pronouns, demonstratives and articles. Let us see these differences in some detail.

Pronunciation

Eastern dialects have eight vowels, as compared to seven for western varieties. The extra vocalic sound in the Central and the Balearic dialects is the neutral vowel, which can roughly be thought of as an English schwa (the sound of a in above), only a little closer. This sound is used in both stressed and unstressed syllables in Balearic, but only in unstressed syllables in the Central dialect.

Eastern dialects pronounce with the neutral vowel any unstressed a or e, while Western dialects clearly distinguish both vowels.

Vocabulary

Some words for everyday concepts are different in the various dialects. However, in most cases speakers from one dialect are aware that a different term is used in other regions (cf. English autumn/fall, maize/corn, nappies/diapers, lucerne/alfalfa, draughts/ checkers, tap/faucet, lorry/truck, pavement/sidewalk...).

The following table shows some of the words that differ from dialect to dialect;

English	Central	Valencian	North-West	Balearic	Roussill.
glass	vas / got	got	got	tassó	veire
broom	escombra	granera	granera	granera	raspall
navel	llombrígol	melic	melic	guixa	llombrígol
stockings	mitges	calces	mitges	calces	mitges
boy	noi	xiquet	xic	al·lot	noi
mirror	mirall	espill	mirall	mirall	mirall
mason	paleta	obrer	paleta	picapedrer	peirer
napkin	tovalló	servilleta	tovalló	torcaboques	servieta
lips	llavis	llavis/morros	llavis	morros	morros
cat	gat	gat	gat	moix	gat
to take away	treure	llevar	treure	treure	treure
to go out	sortir	eixir	sortir	sortir	sortir
grandfather	avi	agüelo	padrí	padrí	avi

Verb conjugation

Several verb tenses are different in the various dialects. We use the verbs cantar and conduir to illustrate these differences:

Verb tense (with rough Eng. equiv.)	Central	Valencian	North- Western	Balearic	Roussillon- ese
Present, Indicative (1^st conjug.) (I sing)	canto	cante	canto	cant	canti
Present, Indicative (3^rd conjug.) (I conduct)	condueixo	conduixc	condueixo	conduesc	condueixo
Present, Subjunctive (For me to sing)	canti	cante	cante	canti	canti
Past Perfect (I sang)	vaig cantar	cantí	vaig cantar	vaig cantar	vaig cantar
Past Imperfect, Subjunctive (If I sang)	cantés	cantara	cantés	cantàs	cantés

Morphology of pronouns, demonstratives and articles

English	Central	Valencian	North-West	Balearic	Roussill.
the	el, la, els, les	el, la, els, les	lo, la, els, les	es, sa, ses	el, la, els, les
me	em/me	me	me	me	me
us	ens/nos	mos, mo	mos	mos	nos
this	aquest	est	aquest	aquest	aquei

The alphabet and the pronunciation of Catalan

Catalan has 27 letters and a number of digraphs, i.e., groups of two letters representing a single sound. It also uses two accents, the dieresis, and the apostrophe.

The letters of the Catalan alphabet

Letter	Name	Pronunciation
A	a	In unstressed syllables, like a in above. In stressed syllables, a little closer than a in father
B	be	Like English b, but with the lips not totally closed, except in final position where it sounds like Catalan p.
C	ce	Like English s in the syllables ce, ci. Like a "soft" English k (e.g. skin) in all other contexts
Ç	ce trencada	Like English s.
D	de	Like th in either, except in final position where it sounds like Catalan t.
E	e	In unstressed syllables, like English a in above. In stressed syllables, it may have one of two sounds: "Open", like French e in lunettes. "Close", like French é in téléphone.
F	efa	Like English f.
G	ge	Like z in azure, in the syllables ge, gi. Like g in get, in all other contexts except final -ig, which is a digraph, and final -g (preceded by any letter other than i), which sounds like Catalan k.
H	hac	Soundless
I	i	Like English ee in seem.
J	jota	Like English z in azure.
K	ka	Like a "soft" English k (e.g. skin)
L	ela	Like English l.
M	ema	Like English m
N	ena	Like English n
O	o	In unstressed syllables, like English oo in food. In stressed syllables, it may have one of two sounds: "Open", like French o in rose. "Close", like French eau in peau.
P	p	Like a "soft" English p (e.g. spin).
Q	cu	Always followed by either U or Ü. The group QU or QÜ sounds like kw in the syllables qua, qüe, qüi, quo, and like k in que, qui.
R	erra	Intervocalic r: Flapped, like r in British English very. Initial or end-of-syllable r, or the combination rr: Trilled, like the Spanish rr of perro—a very difficult sound for a speaker of English. Final r is more often than not not pronounced.
S	essa	Intervocalic s: Like English z. Other cases (including ss): Like s in soap.
T	te	Like a "soft" English t (e.g. sting).
U	u	Roughly like English oo in food. Is soundless in the combinations gue, gui, que, qui.
V	ve baixa	Sounds exactly like Catalan b.
W	ve doble	Like English w (very seldom used).
X	ics	Like English sh at the beginning of a word or after l, n, r or a diphthong ending in i or u. E. g. xarop, rodanxa, escorxador, deixa, disbauxa. Like English gz in initial ex-. E.g. examen, èxit. Like English ks in other cases. E.g. òxid, fix.
Y	i grega	Like English y (seldom used, except in the digraph ny).
Z	zeta	Like English z.

The digraphs

Digraph	Name	Pronunciation
LL	ella	Like ly pronounced with a single glide of the tongue (similar to Spanish ll, Italian gli, Portuguese lh).
L·L	ela geminada	Like two consecutive l’s, as in cèl·lula "cell".
RR		Trilled r.
SS		Like English ss.
NY		Like ny pronounced with a single glide of the tongue (similar to Spanish ñ, French or Italian gn, Portuguese nh).
QU		Like a k (in the syllables que, qui).
GU		Like English gu in guess (in the syllables gue, gui).
IG		At the end of a word, like English ch.
TG		In the syllables tge, tgi: like English j.
TJ		Like English j.
TS		Like English ts, but in a single emission, like German or Italian z in Zoll or zucchero.
TX		Like English ch.
TZ		Like English dz, but in a single emission, like Italian z in condizione.

The diacritics and the apostrophe

Sign	Name	Function
´	Acute accent	Indicates that the stressed vowel is close. E.g. dóna (close o: "gives") vs. dona (open o: "woman"); bé (close e: "well") vs. be (open e: "lamb"). The vowels i and u are always close.
`	Grave accent	Indicates that the stressed vowel is open. E.g. mòlt (open o: "ground" [adjective]) vs. molt (close o: "much, very"); pèl (open e: "hair") vs. pel (neutral e: "by the" [a contraction]). The vowel a is always open.
¨	Dieresis	1) Indicates that the vowel bearing it (always an i or a u) does not form a dipthong with the previous one. E.g. reïna (3 syllables: "resin") vs. reina (2 syllables: "queen"). 2) Indicates that a u is pronounced in the groups güe, güi, qüe, qüi. E.g. aigüera "kitchen sink", eloqüència "eloquence".
’	Apostrophe	Indicates that a vowel is supressed. E.g. et (objective case of "you") + estimo ("I love") = t’estimo ("I love you").

The sounds of Catalan

A language may have less letters than sounds. This is the case of Catalan. As we have already seen, the same letter may have two or more possible pronunciations. Here we summarize the sounds of Catalan, with example words. We use special phonetic signs to represent these sounds.

Sign	Example words	Rough equivalent
/A/	cap	a in father, only a little closer.
/a/	emoció, amor, Barcelona	a in above
/E/	èxit, compleixo	Open e, like French e in ciel.
/e/	bé, fer	Close e, like French e in parler.
/i/	petit	ee in feet
/O/	mòlt, dona	Open o, like French o in pomme.
/o/	dóna, molt	Close o, like French eau in peau
/u/	sovint, punxa	oo in food.
/b/	be, vaca	b in bat, only with lips less tightly pressed
/d/	dit	th in that
/f/	fet	f in fist
/g/	gota	g in get.
/zh/	jeure, pàgina	z in azure, g in rouge
/k/	cama, quilo, quasi, kàiser, psicòleg	"soft" k, as in skin
/l/	làmina	l in lip
/ly/	llapis	li in million, but in a single glide of the tongue
/m/	mare	m in map
/n/	nou	n in nut
/ny/	canya	ny in canyon, but in a single glide of the tongue.
/p/	pare, tub	"soft" p, as in spot
/r/	cara	flapped r, as in British very or Spanish cara
/rr/	roca, carro	trilled r, as in Spanish perro (most difficult sound)
/s/	soca, massa, puça	s in soap
/t/	tasca, solitud	"soft" t, as in stick
/sh/	xarop, compleix	sh in ship
/ch/	metxa, roig	ch in chin
/ts/	potser	ts in a single emission, like German z in Zucker
/dz/	dotze	dz in a single emission, like Italian z in condizione
/j/	jutge, mitja, adjacent	j in jest
/w/	diuen	w in water
/y/	noia	y in yes
/z/	casa, zero	z in zeal

Rules of stress

Catalan, as different from such languages as English, German or Italian, can exactly indicate where the stress falls in any word. The two accents are used for that purpose, but the rules of stress are so designed that most words do not need an accent.

FIRST RULE: The stress falls in the next-to-last syllable in all unaccented words ending in -a, -e, -i, -o, -u, -as, -es, -is, -os, -us, -en, -in, except where i or u are part of a diphthong.

SECOND RULE: The stress falls in the last syllable in all unaccented words with a different ending than those contemplated in the first rule.

THIRD RULE: In accented words, the stress falls in the vowel bearing the diacritic. The accent is always acute (´) when placed over an i or a u, and grave (`) when placed over an a. When the accented vowel is an e or an o, the accent is acute if the vowel is close and grave if the vowel is open.

Word order and sentence structure

Catalan is an SVO, modified-modifier language. This means that the typical order of the elements in a Catalan sentence is:

Subject - Verb - Object

And the adjectives and nouns are normally placed in the sequence

Noun - Adjective

Catalan is also a prepositional language, i.e., it has prepositions (as different from pospositional tongues in which particles indicating spatial or temporal relationships are placed after the word they modify).

However, a few remarks are in order.

When the object is expressed by means of an unstressed pronoun, it is normally placed before the verb. In Catalan we may say:

En Joan beu aigua John drinks water

But if aigua is to be expressed by the corresponding pronoun, la "it", then we must say

En Joan la beu John drinks it (literally, "John it drinks")

The latter is in fact an SOV Catalan sentence. The moral is that the SVO, SOV categories are not absolute.

Even in cases where the normal order would be SVO, Catalan offers the possibility of different combinations of the sentence elements. In fact, the word order in Catalan is one of the freest of all prepositional languages. Thus, the sentence

En Pere vindrà demà Peter will come tomorrow

can be restated as

Vindrà en Pere demà literally, "Will come Peter tomorrow"

Vindrà demà, en Pere literally, "Will come tomorrow Peter"

En Pere demà vindrà literally, "Peter tomorrow will come"

Demà en Pere vindrà literally, "Tomorrow Peter will come"

Demà vindrà en Pere literally, "Tomorrow will come Peter"

Each of these sentences has a distinct shade of meaning, the element appearing in the first place usually being the one the speaker wants to stress.

As for adjectives, they can be placed before a noun in certain cases. Some adjectives have both a concrete and a figurative meaning. In such cases, they are placed after the noun if they are concrete, and before the noun if they are figurative. Take for example the English sentence

The original proof for this theorem was given by Einstein

One does not know whether "original" here means "the first in a series" or "fresh, inventive, novel". In Catalan, however, we may say either of the following:

La prova original d’aquest teorema la va donar Einstein

L’original prova d’aquest teorema la va donar Einstein

In the first case (adjective follows noun), we are talking about firstness. In the second case (adjective precedes noun), we are talking about ingenuity.

Nouns and adjectives: gender and number

Catalan nouns and adjectives can be masculine or feminine, and they can be expressed in the singular or in the plural. An adjective must have the same gender and number as the noun it is modifying.

Nouns ending in -a are normally feminine, while those ending in -e are more often than not masculine.

Abstract nouns are frequently feminine, notably those ending in -tat (-ty), -ció (-tion), and -or (-ness). For example estabilitat "stability", nació "nation", and rojor "redness" are all feminine.

Forming the plurals of both nouns and adjectives invariably involves an s ending, with some slight modifications according to word ending:

WORD ENDING	FORMATION OF PLURAL	EXAMPLES
unstressed -a	-es substituted for -a	casa ----> cases
-à -è -é -í -ò -ó -ú	-ns added, accent removed	cançó ----> cançons
-s preceded by a stressed vowel	-os added in some cases -sos added in some other cases	francès ----> francesos congrés ----> congressos
-s in an unstressed syllable	no change	llapis ----> llapis
-s (preceded by a consonant in a stressed syllable), -x, -ç	-os added	trasbals ----> trasbalsos fix ----> fixos dolç ----> dolços
-st, -xt, -sc	either -s or -os added	bosc ----> either boscs or boscos
-ig	either -s added or -jos (or, in some cases, -tjos) substituted for -ig.	boig ----> either boigs or bojos desig ----> either desigs or desitjos
All other endings	-s added	eixam ----> eixams

The article

Definite article

Catalan can express both gender and number in the definite article, which has thus the following four different forms:

	Masculine	Feminine
Singular	el	la
Plural	els	les

Indefinite article

This also has four forms:

	Masculine	Feminine
Singular	un	una
Plural	uns	unes

Personal article

Catalan has a special kind of article that is regularly placed before a person’s name. It has masculine and feminine forms, thus indicating the person’s gender. The forms are also dependent on whether the name begins with a vowel or a consonant:

	Masculine	Feminine
Before consonant	en	la (colloquial)
		na (formal)
Before vowel	l’ (colloquial)	la (colloquial, before unstressed i or u.)
		l’ (colloquial, in all other cases)
	n’ (formal)
		n’ (formal)

Here are some examples of the use of the personal article:

En Ricard és el meu amic Richard is my friend.

Aquest regal és per a l’Ignasi This present is for Ignace.

No crec que la Carme vingui a la festa I don’t think Carmen will come to the party.

Això ho decidirà la Isabel Isabella will decide so.

Què hi és, l’Àngela? Is Angela there?

Certifiquem que n’Enric Puig... This is to certify that Henry Hill...

Lamentem el decés de na Rosa Pont. We regret Rose Bridge’s demise.

Prepositions and contractions

Catalan has a great many prepositions and an even larger number of prepositional phrases. We mention here some of the commonest and most important ones:

Preposition	Meaning & examples
a	to: anem a dinar, ‘let’s go have lunch’ in, at, on: sóc a Barcelona ‘I am in Barcelona’
amb	with: surt amb la Marta ‘he’s going out with Martha’
cap, cap a	towards: caminant cap allà ‘walking towards that point’
damunt	on: damunt l’armari ‘on the chest’
de	of: el barri més antic de la ciutat ‘the oldest quarter of the city’ from: ve de París ‘he’s coming from Paris’
des de	from: des del meu punt de vista ‘from my vantage point’ since: des de llavors no m’ha parlat ‘he hasn’t talked to me since’
dins	into, inside: entrà dins la casa ‘he went into the house’
en	in: en altres paraules ‘in other words’
entre	between, among: entre tu i jo ‘between you and me’
fins	until: em quedaré aquí fins que vingui ‘I’ll stay here till he comes’ up to: camina fins a la plaça ‘walk up to the square’
per	by: fou condemnada pel jurat ‘she was found guilty by the jury’ because of, for: per aquesta raó ‘for this reason’
per a	for: això és per a vostè ‘this is for you’
rere, darrere	behind: s’amagava rere l’arbre ‘he was hiding behind the tree’
sense	without: cançons sense paraules ‘songs without words’
sobre	on, over: sobre la taula ‘on the table’
sota	under: sota el mirall ‘under the mirror’

Contractions

The prepositions a, de and per, when followed by a masculine definite article, are merged with it to form a contraction.

Preposition	Article	Contraction
a	el	al
a	els	als
de	el	del
de	els	dels
per	el	pel
per	els	pels

Adjectives

Possessives

Catalan has possessives of two kinds: stressed and unstressed. The stressed possessives are by far the most often used, unstressed possessives being employed in just a few idiomatic expressions.

Stressed possessives

Stressed possessives are not definite. This means that a demonstrative or an article are needed elsewhere in the sentence in order to exactly define what we are talking about. These possessives have various forms according to the gender and number of the possessed object.

In the following tables the masculine and feminine gender and the singular and plural numbers are noted M, F, Sing., and Pl., respectively.

Possessive		Meaning	Examples
1^st person, Siing.	meu (M., Sing.) meva (F., Sing.) meus (M., Pl.) meves (F., Pl.)	my, mine	el meu cotxe ‘my car’ una meva companya ‘a classmate of mine’ aquests meus parents ‘these relatives of mine’ els meus amics ‘my friends’
2^nd person, Sing.	teu teva teus teves	your, yours (Sing.)	el teu cotxe ‘your car’ etc. (analogous with 1^st person, Sing.)
3^rd person, Sing.	seu seva seus seves	his, her, hers, its	el seu cotxe ‘his or her or its car’, etc. (analogous with 1^st person, Sing.)
1^st person, pl	nostre (M., Sing.) nostra (F., Sing.) nostres (either M. or F., Pl.)	our, ours	el nostre amic ‘our male friend’ la nostra amiga ‘our female friend’ els nostres amics ‘our male friends’ les nostres amigues ‘our female friends’
2^nd person, pl.	vostre vostra vostres	your, yours (Pl.)	el vostre amic ‘your male friend’, etc. (analogous with 1^st person, Pl.)
3^rd person, pl.	seu seva seus seves	their, theirs	el seu cotxe ‘their car’ una seva amiga ‘a female friend of theirs’

Unstressed possessives

Unstressed possessives are definite. They are used with names of kinship and in a few other instances.

Possessive		Meaning	Examples
1^st person, Sing.	mon (M., Sing.) ma (F., Sing.) mos (M., Pl.) mes (F., Pl.)	my	mon pare ‘my father’ en ma vida ‘in my life’ mos pares ‘my parents’ mes ties ‘my aunts’
2^nd person, Sing.	ton ta tos tes	your (Sing.)	ton pare ‘your father’, etc. (analogous with 1^st person, Sing.)
3^rd person, Sing.	son sa sos ses	his, her, hers, its	son pare ‘his or her father’, etc. (analogous with 1^st person, Sing.)
1^st person, pl	nostre (M., Sing.) nostra (F., Sing.) nostres (either M. or F., Pl.)	our	nostre pare ‘our father’ en nostra vida ‘in our life’ nostres pares ‘our parents’ nostres ties ‘our aunts’
2^nd person, pl.	vostre vostra vostres	your, yours (Pl.)	vostre pare ‘your father’, etc. (analogous with 1^st person, Pl.)
3^rd person, pl.	llur (M., F., Sing.) llurs (M., F., Pl.)	their, theirs	llur pare ‘their father’ llurs col·laboradors ‘thei collaborators’

The forms, mos, mes, tos, tes, sos, ses, nostre, nostra, nostres, vostre, vostra, vostres, are hardly ever used. The forms, llur, llurs belong to the literary register of the language.

Demonstratives

Three demonstratives exist in Catalan, although only two of them are actually used in speech. All three have masculine and feminine, singular and plural form. In the following table, the forms of each demonstrative are given in the usual order: M. Sing., F. Sing., M. Pl., F. Pl.

Demonstrative	Meaning	Examples
aquest aquesta aquests aquestes	this, that	aquest país no canvia més ‘this country will never change’ és de seda aquesta corbata? ‘is that a silk tie?’
aqueix aqueixa aqueixos aqueixes	that	plou en aqueixa ciutat? ‘is it raining in that (i.e. your) city?
aquell aquella aquells aquelles	that	porta’m aquella cadira ‘bring me that chair over there’

In principle, aquest refers to things next to the speaker, aqueix to things next to the person he or she is speaking to, and aquell to things away from both. However, aqueix has been dropped from the spoken language, and it is used only in the most formal writing. Modern aquest combines the meanings of older-usage aquest and aqueix.

Numerals

Numerals may be cardinal (representing quantity but not order), ordinal (representing a position in a series) or partitive (representing fractions). Partitives and ordinals are generally identical. The following table lists the basic numerals.

No.	Cardinal	Ordinal	Partitive
1	u, un, una	primer	-
2	dos, dues	segon	mig
3	tres	tercer	terç
4	quatre	quart	quart
5	cinc	cinquè, cinquena	cinquè, cinquena
6	sis	sisè	sisè
7	set	setè	setè
8	vuit	vuitè	vuitè
9	nou	novè	novè
10	deu	desè	dècim, dècima
11	onze	onzè	onzè
12	dotze	dotzè	dotzè
13	tretze	tretzè	tretzè
14	catorze	catorzè	catorzè
15	quinze	quinzè	quinzè
16	setze	setzè	setzè
17	disset	dissetè	dissetè
18	divuit	divuitè	divuitè
19	dinou	dinovè	dinovè
20	vint	vintè	vintè
21	vint-i-u	vint-i-unè	vint-i-unè
22	vint-i-dos	vint-i-dosè	vint-i-dosè
29	vint-i-nou	vint-i-novè	vint-i-novè
30	trenta	trentè	trentè
31	trenta-u	trenta-unè	trenta-unè
40	quaranta	quarantè	quarantè
47	quaranta-set	quaranta-setè	quaranta-setè
50	cinquanta	cinquantè	cinquantè
56	cinquanta-sis	cinquanta-sisè	cinquanta-sisè
60	seixanta	seixantè	seixantè
64	seixanta-quatre	seixanta-quatrè	seixanta-quatrè
70	setanta	setantè	setantè
78	setanta-vuit	setanta-vuitè	setanta-vuitè
80	vuitanta	vuitantè	vuitantè
85	vuitanta-cinc	vuitanta-cinquè	vuitanta-cinquè
90	noranta	norantè	norantè
99	noranta-nou	noranta-novè	noranta-novè
100	cent	centè	centèsim, centèsima
200	dos-cents	dos-centè	dos-centè
357	tres-cents cinquanta-set	tres-cents cinquanta-setè	tres-cents cinquanta-setè
596	cinc-cents noranta-sis	cinc-cents noranta-sisè	cinc-cents noranta-sisè
822	vuit-cents vint-i-dos	vuit-cents vint-i-dosè	vuit-cents vint-i-dosè
999	nou-cents noranta-nou	nou-cents noranta-novè	nou-cents noranta-novè
1000	mil	milè	mil·lèsim, mil·lèsima
1312	mil tres-cents dotze	mil tres-cents dotzè	mil tres-cents dotzè

All forms ending in -è in the preceding table have feminines in -ena; we gave just one example, that of cinquè, cinquena. All the other ones are analogous to this one. This ending, -è, provides thus an easy way for constructing both ordinals and partitives starting from the corresponding cardinal, for numbers equal or larger than five.

Quantitatives

These adjectives express quantity without specifying it.

Quantitative	Meaning	Example
quant quanta quants quantes	how much, how many	Quant sucre cal posar-hi? ‘How much sugar must be added? No sé quantes germanes té ‘I don’t know how many sisters he has’
molt molta molts moltes	very much, many, a great deal, a lot, lots of	Bec molt cafè ‘I drink lots of coffee’ Té moltes dèries ‘She’s got many hobbies’
tant tanta tants tantes	so many, so much	No sabia que estudiés tanta gent aquí ‘I didn’t know so many people studied here’ Estic cansat de tant brogit ‘I’m tired of so much noise’
poc poca pocs poques	few, little	Tenim poc temps ‘We have little time’ pocs actors triomfen ‘few actors get to succeed’
bastant bastants	several, enough, (quite) a few	ha sortit amb bastants nois ‘she’s gone out with quite a few boys’ pren bastant aliment ‘she takes enough food’
més	more	té més discos que jo ‘he’s got more discs than me’
menys	less, fewer	hi ha menys aturats ara ‘there are fewer jobless now’
força	much, many	força cadires ‘many chairs’
massa	too much, too many	massa paraules ‘too many words’ massa sucre ‘too much sugar’
que ...!	how many...!	Que dones! ‘How many women!’
gens de	no	Gens de pa ‘No bread’
prou	enough	Tenim prou cintes? ‘Do we have enough ribbons?’

Quantitatives, save for força, massa and que, may optionally be followed by the preposition de with no change in meaning. In the case of gens, the preposition de is mandatory.

Indefinites

Indefinite adjectives determine the noun affected by them in a most imprecise way.

Indefinite	Meaning	Examples
algun alguna alguns algunes	some	algun dia et visitaré ‘I’ll call on you some day’ et presentaré algunes noies ‘I’ll have you meet some girls’
tot tota tots totes	all, whole	no tots els ocells volen ‘not all birds fly’ ha plorat tota l’estona ‘she’s been crying all the time’
mateix mateixa mateixos mateixes	same	fem el mateix pastís que l’altre dia ‘let’s cook the same cake as the other day’ és la mateixa cosa amb diferent nom ‘it’s the same thing with a different name’.
altre altra altres	other	en altres paraules ‘in other words’ la soja és una altra font de proteïna ‘soybeans are another source of protein’
tal tals	such	fes-ho de tal manera que no s’enfadin ‘do so in such a way that they don’t get angry’
qualsevol qualssevol	any	en qualsevol cas ‘in any case’
cada	each, every	cada cosa al seu lloc ‘everything in its place’
cap	no, any	no hi ha cap porta ‘there’s no door’
ambdós	both	ambdós germans ‘both brothers’
sengles	one... each	tenien sengles vaixells ‘they owned one boat each’

Interrogatives

Catalan has just one interrogative adjective, with the four usual forms according to number and gender.

Interrogative

Meaning

Examples

quin

quina

quins

quines

which, what

Quina hora és? ‘What time is it?’

Digues-me quin regal t’estimaries més ‘Tell me which present you would like most’

Relatives

There exists just one relative adjective in Catalan. It is not used in the spoken language, but it is employed with some frequency in writing. The definite article is invariably attached to this adjective

Relative	Meaning	Examples
qual quals	which	Volen construir un pont, per al qual objectiu s’estan recaptant contribucions ‘They want to build a bridge, for which goal contributions are being collected’

Pronouns

Demonstratives

There exist three demonstrative pronouns that are inflected according to gender and number; and three neuter ones.

Demonstrative	Meaning	Examples
aquest aquesta aquests aquestes	this (one), these (ones), that (one), those (ones)	dona’m aquest, el que és al teu escriptori ‘give me that one, the one on your desk’. aquest és el polític més intel·ligent del país ‘this is the most intelligent politician in this country’
aqueix aqueixa aqueixos aqueixes	that (one), those (ones)	aqueix és el vestit que tenies posat ahir? ‘is that the dress you were wearing yesterday?’ vindran aqueixos? ‘will those ones come?’
aquell aquella, aquells, aquelles	that (one), those (ones)	En Pere és aquell ‘Peter is that one over there’ Quines noies? Aquelles que em vas presentar? ‘Which girls? Those ones you introduced me to?’
açò	this	açò no és tan simple ‘this is not so simple’
això	this, that	això és cert ‘that’s true’ això és per a tu ‘this is for you’
allò	that	allò va ser una aventura passatgera ‘that was a short-lived affair’

As happens with the corresponding (and identical) adjectives, the demonstrative pronouns aquest, aqueix and aquell express three degrees of proximity, but in actual usage aqueix has been dropped in favor of aquest. Something similar happens with açò, això and allò, only in this case the survivor has been the pronoun corresponding to the second degree of proximity; namely, això combines the meaning of older-usage açò and això.