Breakdown of Un milione di persone visitano la città ogni anno.
la persona
the person
l'anno
the year (m)
la città
the city
visitare
to visit
ogni
every
il milione
the million
Questions & Answers about Un milione di persone visitano la città ogni anno.
Why do we need the word "di" (of) after "un milione"? We don't say "a million of people" in English.
In Italian, smaller numbers like cento (a hundred) and mille (a thousand) act like adjectives and attach straight to the noun. However, milione (a million) and miliardo (a billion) are actually nouns. Because they are nouns, you have to connect them to the next word using di, literally translating to "a million of people."
"Un milione" is a singular phrase, so why is the verb "visitano" in the plural "they" form?
When a singular quantity word (like un milione or un sacco) is followed by di and a plural noun (like persone), Italian speakers often use the plural verb (visitano). This is because the logical subject actually doing the visiting is the plural "people." Using the singular verb (visita) is also grammatically correct, but the plural is very common and natural here.
Does "ogni" (every) ever change its ending to match masculine or feminine nouns?
Why does "città" have an accent mark at the end?
The accent mark tells you to put the stress of your voice on that final syllable when you speak (chit-TAH). As a very useful rule to remember: Italian nouns that end in an accented vowel don't change their spelling in the plural. If you wanted to say "the cities," you would just change the article to plural: le città.
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