Masculine il padre il ristorante il sale il cognome 

father restaurant salt surname 

Feminine la madre la notte la luce la chiave 

mother night light key 

To help you to determine the gender of some nouns ending in -e , here is a rule: nouns ending in -sione  or -zione  are feminine: 

la televisione [f] la pensione [f] la produzione [f] la stazione [f] 

television pension production station 

Sometimes, the gender of a noun ending in -e can be determined by the gender of the person it refers to: masculine when it refers to a male, feminine when it refers to a female: 

il / la cantante  [m/f] il / la cliente  [m/f] il / la parente  [m/f] l’inglese  [m/f] 

(male/female) singer (male/female) customer (male/female) relative Englishman/Englishwoman 

5 Some nouns ending in -a and referring to persons are masculine when they refer to a male and feminine when they refer to a female:* 

il / la collega  [m/f] l’atleta  [m/f] il / la batterista  [m/f] il / la pianista  [m/f] 

(male/female) colleague (male/female) athlete (male/female) drummer (male/female) pianist 

* There are some exceptions: e.g. la persona (person) and la guida (tourist guide) are always feminine, even when they refer to a male, while the feminine of il poeta (poet) is la poetessa . 

6 There are some nouns ending in -a which are masculine and some nouns ending in -o which are feminine: 

Masculine il cinema il papà il problema 

cinema dad problem 

Feminine l’auto la foto la mano 

car photo hand 

