Learn Italian: Signore, la Sua stanza è al terzo piano. - Sir, your room is on the third floor.

Signore, la Sua stanza è al terzo piano.

Sir, your room is on the third floor.

Breakdown of Signore, la Sua stanza è al terzo piano.

Questions & Answers about Signore, la Sua stanza è al terzo piano.

Why does terzo come before piano, and does its ending change?

In Italian, ordinal numbers like terzo (third) usually come before the noun they describe, just like in English. Because they act as adjectives, their endings must match the gender and number of the noun. Since piano (floor) is masculine and singular, we use terzo. If we were talking about a feminine noun like stanza (room), it would be terza.

Why is Sua capitalized here, and why do we need la in front of it?

Sua is capitalized because it is the formal way to say "your" when addressing someone respectfully, as shown by the word Signore. In Italian, possessive words almost always need a definite article before them. We use la because the noun it describes, stanza, is feminine and singular.

Why does the sentence use al for "on the" instead of a word meaning "on"?

In English, we say a room is "on" a floor, but Italian uses the preposition a (at/to) when talking about floors of a building. Here, a combines with the definite article il (which is required before terzo piano) to make the combined word al.

Why is it just Signore and not Il signore at the beginning of the sentence?