Learn Italian: Quel ragazzone mangia sempre tanta carne. - That big boy always eats a lot of meat.

Quel ragazzone mangia sempre tanta carne.

That big boy always eats a lot of meat.

Breakdown of Quel ragazzone mangia sempre tanta carne.

quello

that

tanto

so much, a lot / as (in comparisons)

Questions & Answers about Quel ragazzone mangia sempre tanta carne.

What does the -one ending do in the word ragazzone?

It is an augmentative suffix! Adding -one to a noun usually adds the meaning of 'big' or 'large'. So, ragazzo (boy) becomes ragazzone (big boy). Notice that the original ending vowel of the word is dropped before adding the suffix.

Why is the word for 'that' quel instead of quello?

Quello changes its ending to match the noun that follows it, using the exact same rules as the definite article. Because ragazzone uses the article il (il ragazzone), quello takes the matching form and becomes quel.

Why does the sentence use tanta instead of tanto?

Tanto means 'a lot' or 'much', and when it describes a noun, it acts like an adjective and must match that noun's gender and number. Carne (meat) is a feminine singular noun, so tanto changes to its feminine singular form, tanta.

Why does sempre come after the verb mangia? In English we say 'always eats'.

In Italian, adverbs of frequency like sempre (always) usually go right after the conjugated verb. While in English you put 'always' before the verb, the natural word order in Italian is mangia sempre (literally 'eats always').