Kongruenz der Adjektive

A Latvian adjective agrees with its noun in gender, number and case. English adjectives keep one form ("a big table", "big houses"); Latvian adjectives take endings that echo the noun's.

Nominative

	Masculine	Feminine
singular	liels galds - a big table	liela māja - a big house
plural	lieli galdi - big tables	lielas mājas - big houses

The adjective endings look like the noun endings of the first (masculine) and fourth (feminine) declensions, whatever the noun's own declension is: liels brālis (a big brother), laba māte (a good mother), skaista pils (a beautiful castle).

Other cases

Case	Masculine singular	Feminine singular
nominative	liels galds	liela māja
genitive	liela galda	lielas mājas
dative	lielam galdam	lielai mājai
accusative	lielu galdu	lielu māju
locative	lielā galdā	lielā mājā

So: Es dzīvoju lielā mājā - I live in a big house. Es pērku jaunu velosipēdu - I'm buying a new bike.

Position

The adjective normally comes before the noun, as in English: sarkana kleita (a red dress). After ir it still agrees: Kafija ir karsta (The coffee is hot), Laiks ir silts (The weather is warm).

For English speakers

The typical slip is to learn one form of each adjective (often the masculine) and use it everywhere: *liels māja. Look at the noun's ending and match it. The good news is that adjectives have just two gender patterns, so once you know liels / liela, every adjective follows: jauns / jauna (new), vecs / veca (old), garšīgs / garšīga (tasty), as in garšīga rupjmaize, tasty dark rye bread.