LATIN DICTIONARYLexicon Latīnum
Allen & Greenough · Part First — Words and Forms › Gender

§32. General Rules of Gender

Names of Female beings, of Cities, Countries, Plants, Trees, and Gems, of many Animals (especially Birds), and of most abstract Qualities, are feminine:—

  • māter, mother; Iūlia, Julia; Rōma, Rome; ītalia, Italy; rosa, rose; pīnus, pine; sapphīrus, sapphire; anas, duck; vēritās, truth.

a. Some names of Towns and Countries are masculine: as, Sulmō, Gabiī (plur.); or neuter, as, Tarentum, Illyricum.

b. A few names of Plants and Gems follow the gender of their termination: as, centaurēum (N.), centaury; acanthus (M.), bearsfoot; opalus (M.), opal.

J. H. Allen and J. B. Greenough, New Latin Grammar (Boston: Ginn, 1903). Text provided under a CC BY-SA license by Perseus Digital Library, http://www.perseus.tufts.edu, with funding from the National Endowment for the Humanities.