Learn Italian: I bicchieri sono fragili. Ne ho imballati venti. - The glasses are fragile. I packed twenty of them.

I bicchieri sono fragili. Ne ho imballati venti.

The glasses are fragile. I packed twenty of them.

Breakdown of I bicchieri sono fragili. Ne ho imballati venti.

Questions & Answers about I bicchieri sono fragili. Ne ho imballati venti.

Why does the past participle imballati end in -i when the subject is 'I'?

Normally, when using avere (like ho), the past participle ends in -o. But when you use the pronoun ne to say 'some of them' or 'a certain number of them,' the past participle must agree with the gender and number of the noun ne replaces. Since ne replaces i bicchieri (masculine plural), imballato changes to imballati.

Why do we need the word ne in the second sentence? Can't I just say ho imballati venti?

In English, you can drop the noun and just say 'I packed twenty.' In Italian, if you state a quantity (like venti) but leave out the noun it refers to, you must include ne before the verb to represent 'of them.'

Why does the adjective fragili end in -i?

The singular form of this adjective is fragile. In Italian, adjectives that end in -e in the singular change their ending to -i in the plural, regardless of whether the noun is masculine or feminine. Because i bicchieri is plural, we use fragili.

I always forget the gender of words ending in -e. How can we tell that bicchieri is masculine?