Page:A Concise Grammar of the Malagasy Language.djvu/38



The scarcity of true adjectives in the Malagasy language is supplied in various ways, viz. by the free use of verbs as adjectives or participles, as already said; by the use of words which are verbal in form but practically adjectives; as, vavàna (root vàva), talkative, literally 'mouthed'.

By the use of nouns for our adjectives of material; as, tràno hàzo, 'a house (of) wood', i.e. a wooden house.

By the use of the auxiliary verb àzo for our adjectives in -able and -ible; as, àzo hànina, 'able (to be) eaten', i.e. eatable.