-ito confusion

Question

Today we learned about the endings -ísimo/a and -ito/a in Spanish class. While I totally understand the -ísimo endings, I am quite confused on the -ito endings. My textbook simply says that to form -ito endings, you usually just replace the final vowel of a noun with the ito/ita and that other endings like cito, illo and uelo are just variations that can be used in different countries. I was quite confused then, when I looked at a practice activity in my book and saw that in the activity where you were supposed to add the correct -ito ending the answer to los tigres was los tigrecitos and that mis amigos was mis amiguitos. So, I went to this site and found several articles about -ito rules. However, they all say slightly different things about what you do. So I asked my science teacher (a native spanish speaker) about all of this and HE told me that things like fuego is fuegitos and mago is magitos, making me even more confused. So, my big questions are:

-Do -ito endings follow the same rules as the -ísimos (like c-qu, z-c, g-gu, etc.)? -When do you use -cito? -Is la flor la florcita, la florita or la florecita and is el mago, magito or maguito?

Can anyone please help me?

Answer 1

Check out these links for some info

Spanish/Diminutives

adding 'ito' and 'ita' to the end of words

El diminutivo

Diminuto-Wikilengua

-Do -ito endings follow the same rules as the -ísimos (like c-qu, z-c, g-gu, etc.)?

Same rules

When do you use -cito? -Is la flor la florcita, la florita or la florecita and is el mago, magito or maguito?

When: Words ending in unstressed e/i/u or stressed vowel, Words ending in n or r

florecita / florcita, maguito

According to the following source

Diminutos

En general, para construir el diminutivo en monosílabos acabados en consonantes, se les agrega –ecito, -ecita:

luz ? lucecita

cruz ? crucecita

pez ? pececito

mes ? mesecito

Aunque en algunos países americanos se prefiere:

florcita a florecita (de flor)

pancito a panecito (de pan)

trencito a trenecito (de tren)

In general, to construct the diminutives in one-syllable nouns ending in a consonant, add -ecito, -ecita, thus flor --> florecita. In some Hispanic countries in the Americas, "florcita" is preferred

Thanks for your help. But why is it not florecita? This article says it is: http://www.spanishdict.com/answers/104268/adding-ito-and-ita-to-the-end-of-words. But I have no idea which of you is right. - Kimbos, Feb 1, 2011

Thanks. I didn't notice that. I have rewritten it :) - Fidalgo, Feb 1, 2011

My personal opinion is both can be accepted - Fidalgo, Feb 1, 2011

Answer 2

I would just suggest looking up Diminutives.

The endings of -ita, -ito, -illo are the only ones I really know or use regularly.

-ita is feminine -ito is masculine

They basically make the word "smaller", changing the meaning of the word. Por ejemplo:

gato(cat) -> gatito(little cat, kitten) cama(bed) -> camacita(little bed) pobre(poor) -> pobrecito(poor little masculine thing) gordo(fat) -> gordito(little fat boy/man)

I'm new to the language, so that is about all I can tell you.

Answer 3

I have a English to Spanish, Spanish to English paper dictionary, and it says that flor becomes florecita. Also, one of my spanish books I am learning from says that some general rules are: nouns ending in -o, -a, and -l take ito(a) as an ending, and other nouns take -cito(a).

Hermana becomes hermanita, hombre becomes hombrecito, etc.