Articles with names and proper nouns

Romanian personal names usually appear without a separate article in the basic subject or object phrase: Maria citește. (Maria is reading.) In the genitive-dative, however, a name can change form: Cartea Mariei este pe masă. (Maria's book is on the table.)

How do Romanian personal names show the cases?

Keep a personal name in its base form for the subject and most accusative phrases; for genitive-dative, use the name's standard form or the preposed article lui, depending on the name.

1. For a subject, use the name by itself: Ion a venit. (Ion came.)
2. For a person as a direct object, use the usual object marker pe with the base name: Am văzut-o pe Maria. (I saw Maria.)
3. For possession or a recipient, identify the name pattern before choosing its genitive-dative form: cartea Mariei (Maria's book), but cartea lui Ion (Ion's book).

The first two rows show the standard inflected pattern for feminine first names that can take a feminine genitive-dative ending. The other rows use lui before the unchanged name. The same visible form can express possession or a recipient: Cartea lui Ion (Ion's book), but I-am dat lui Ion cartea. (I gave Ion the book.) For the broader case pattern, see genitive and dative noun forms.

When do place names carry an article?

Place names do not all behave alike: some are normally used as bare names, while others have an articulated form that appears in a noun phrase or in the genitive-dative.

• Use a bare place name in ordinary location phrases: în București (in Bucharest) and din România (from Romania).
• Use the articulated form when the name itself is the noun phrase or is in the genitive-dative: Bucureștiul de azi (today's Bucharest) and centrul Bucureștiului (the center of Bucharest).
• Some names already contain a common noun with its own article: Marea Neagră (the Black Sea). Learn the complete name rather than adding an article mechanically.
• Country names can have their own established forms: România is the normal name, and României is its genitive-dative form. Do not replace it with a separate word meaning the.

The definite article is usually attached to common nouns, but proper names have lexical patterns of their own. DOOM3 records the forms of individual names, so check a doubtful city, country, institution, or title instead of applying one ending to every proper noun.

What variation should you recognize?

Neutral contemporary Standard Romanian favors Mariei for a feminine first name such as Maria and lui Ion for a masculine name such as Ion. DOOM3 also records special vocative forms such as Ioane, while ordinary current address commonly keeps the base name: Ion, vino! (Ion, come!).

• Treat lui before a name as a genitive-dative article pattern in phrases such as sora lui Ion (Ion's sister). In sora lui (his sister), lui is instead a possessive pronoun.
• A title or family term can carry the article while the name stays unchanged: doamna Popescu (Mrs Popescu), domnului Popescu (to Mr Popescu), and familia Popescu (the Popescu family).
• Do not transfer the masculine lui pattern to a standard feminine name ending in -a: use Mariei, not lui Maria, in the neutral model taught here.

Mistakes to avoid

• Do not add un or o before an ordinary personal name: say Maria a venit, not o Maria a venit.
• Do not use lui with every name: cartea Mariei and cartea lui Ion follow different standard patterns.
• Do not confuse genitive-dative with direct address: Cartea lui Ion means Ion's book, while Ioane, vino! addresses Ion.