42g Putting adjectives in order
42gPutting adjectives in order
Modifiers are words that give more information about a noun; that is, they modify the meaning of the noun in some way. Some modifiers precede the noun, and others follow it, as indicated in the chart below.
If there are two or more adjectives, their order is variable, but English has strong preferences, described below.
- Subjective adjectives (those that show the writer’s opinion) go before objective adjectives (those that merely describe): these old-fashioned kitchen tiles.
- Adjectives of size generally come early: these large old-fashioned kitchen tiles.
- Adjectives of color generally come late: these beautiful blue kitchen tiles.
- Adjectives derived from proper nouns or from nouns that refer to materials generally come after color terms and right before noun modifiers: these beautiful blue Portuguese ceramic kitchen tiles.
- All other objective adjectives go in the middle, separated by commas (see 54e): these decorative, heat-resistant, old-fashioned blue Portuguese ceramic kitchen tiles.
| Modifier Type | Arrangement | Examples |
| determiners | at the beginning of the noun phrase | these old-fashioned tiles |
| all or both | before any other determiners | all these tiles |
| numbers | after any other determiners | these six tiles |
| noun modifiers | directly before the noun | these kitchen tiles |
| adjectives | between determiners and noun modifiers | these old-fashioned kitchen tiles |
| phrases or clauses | after the noun | the tiles on the wallthe tiles that we bought |
Of course, very long noun phrases are usually out of place in most kinds of writing. Academic and professional types of writing tend to avoid long strings of adjectives.