Breakdown of Quel ragazzone mangia sempre tanta carne.
quello
that
tanto
so much, a lot / as (in comparisons)
sempre
always
mangiare
to eat
la carne
the meat
il ragazzone
the big boy
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?
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').
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