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I pesci sono piccoli e neri.

I pesci sono piccoli e neri.
The fish are small and black.
From Lesson 10:Nouns ending in -e·Italian

Breakdown of I pesci sono piccoli e neri.

essere
to be
e
and
piccolo
small
nero
black
il pesce
the fish

Questions & Answers about I pesci sono piccoli e neri.

Why does the Italian sentence use the plural pesci when the English translation just says "fish"?
In English, the word "fish" looks the same whether it is singular or plural. In Italian, this noun belongs to a class of words that end in -e in the singular (il pesce) and change to -i in the plural (i pesci). Since we are talking about multiple fish, we use the plural form pesci.
How do I know the gender of pesce since it ends in -e instead of -o or -a?
Nouns ending in -e can be either masculine or feminine, so you usually have to memorize their gender when you learn the word. But here, the rest of the sentence gives it away! The masculine plural article i and the masculine plural describing words piccoli and neri tell you that pesce is a masculine noun.
Why use i for the word "the" instead of gli?
Both i and gli are plural words for "the" used with masculine nouns. You use gli before vowels and tricky starting sounds like z or an s followed by another consonant. Because pesci starts with a normal consonant (p), we use the standard plural article i (which is the plural form of il).
Why do the adjectives piccoli and neri both end in -i?
Italian adjectives must match the noun they describe. Since pesci is masculine and plural, the base adjectives piccolo (small) and nero (black) must change their endings to the masculine plural -i, making them piccoli and neri.

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