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Friday, January 12, 2024

Tree and Fruit Names in Italian – Which Gender?


Dealing with the gender of fruit trees and fruits in Italian.


In Italian, every noun has a gender, either masculine or feminine. This gender is essential for agreement with other parts of the sentence, such as articles, adjectives, and pronouns. 

When it comes to fruit trees and the fruits they produce, there’s a twist in Italian. While in English, you make the name of a fruit tree by adding “tree” after the fruit name, in Italian you use the same word for fruit but switch the gender of the fruit from feminine to masculine. For example, “apple” in Italian is “mela” (feminine), and “apple tree” is “melo” (masculine) as in “La storia di George Washington che abbatte un melo è una leggenda. Poi ha mangiato una mela?” 

Many fruit trees and their fruit follow this pattern, but not all! What did you expect? 

Here are the ones following the pattern.

masculine albero or “tree” / feminine frutta or “fruit” / English

  • l’albicocco / l’albicocca / “apricot”
  • l’arancio / l’arancia / “orange”
  • il banano / la banana / “banana”
  • il castagno / la castagna / “chestnut”
  • il ciliegio / la ciliegia / “cherry”
  • il mandorlo / la mandorla / “almond”
  • il melo / la mela / “apple”
  • il melo cotogno / la mela cotogna / “quince”
  • il melograno / la melagrana / “pomegranate”
  • il moro / la mora / “blackberry”
  • il nespolo / la nespola / “medlar”
  • il nespolo del Giappone / la nespola del Giappone / “loquat”
  • il nocciolo / la nocciola / “hazelnut”
  • il pero / la pera / “pear”
  • il pesco / la pesca / “peach”
  • il prugno / la prugna / “prune”
  • il sorbo / la sorba / “sorb”
  • il susino / la susina / “plum”

Now the exceptions.

Invariant spelling but gender article changes:

  • il noce / la noce / “walnut”

Masculine fruits/nut instead of feminine:

  • l’avocado / l’avocado / “avocado”
  • il limone/ il limone / “lemon”
  • il dattero / il dattero / “date”
  • il fico / il fico / “fig”
  • il kiwi / il kiwi / “kiwi”
  • il pistacchio / il pistacchio, / “pistachio”
  • il pompelmo / il pompelmo / “grapefruit”
  • il lampone / il lampone / “raspberry”
  • il mandarino / il mandarino / “mandarin”
  • il cachi / il cachi / “persimmon”
  • il mango / il mango / “mango”
  • il rampicante? della passione / il frutto della passione / “passion fruit”
  • il mirtillo / il mirtillo / “blueberry”

Feminine trees/bush instead of masculine:

  • la palma / {fruit depends} / “palm”
  • la quercia / la ghianda? "acorn” / “oak”
  • la vite / l’uva “grape” / “grapevine”
  • la papaia / la papaia / “papaya”


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