Nouns are the words we use to name things ( eyeball, horse, pasta, monster, Friday, cloud, face, paint, mascara, jealousy).

They make up the largest group of words in the English language. Here is a quick A to Z guide to types of nouns.

ABSTRACT

Refers to a state, quality or feeling (beauty, luxury, feeling, justice, poverty).

CHAIN

This is a series of three or more nouns with only the last word acting as a noun. The other words act as adjectives. The term was coined by Richard Wydick to draw attention to the increasing use of these unwieldy phrases (soccer game ticket price change, Saturday morning television program time).

CLAUSE

A group of words that have a noun and a verb, but do the job of a noun (the letters growing moldy, a blooming apple bud, several paying customers)

COLLECTIVE

Used to define a group of objects (a flock of birds, a colony of bats, a brood of chickens).

COMMON

Things that can be seen, heard, smelt, tasted or felt (bird, toe, custard, hairspray, teeth, wind)

COMPLEX

Names of objects that contain three or more nouns (see CHAIN)

CONCRETE

Concrete is another name for common. It refers to nouns that can be perceived by one or more of the five senses: seen, heard, smelt, felt or tasted.

COMPOUND

Nouns created by combining two words (haircut, lookout, bedspread, bathroom, toothbrush)

COUNTABLE

Things that can be counted (bottle, table, feet, hands, fingers, chair).

DESCRIPTIVE

These give more information about the object than a generic noun would. For example, fiend or gentleman are far more descriptive than man)

DOLCH

Words found in Edward W Dolch's list of the 95 most commonly used nouns.

FEMININE

Refers to the female version of the thing.

GENDER

Refers to the sex of the thing (boy, lioness, mare).

HEAD

Refers to the main noun in a noun group (dog in big black dog, bud in growing apple bud)

HYPHENATED

Compound nouns created using a hyphen (mother-in-law, jack-in-the-box).

IRREGULAR

The spelling is changed when they become plural (loaf/loaves, cactus/cacti, child/children).

MASCULINE

Refers to the male version of the thing.

MODIFIER

Used to modify another noun (car modifies park to create car park, pickle modifies jar to create pickle jar).

PLURAL

Nouns that refer to more than one thing (women, dentists, sheep, boys)

PROPER

Things that have a unique identity. They always start with a capital (December, Monday, Harry Potter, Ford, Africa, Melissa).

PLURAL POSSESIVE

Plural nouns that show ownership of something (girls' dresses, fish's scales, sheep's wool)

PREPOSITIONAL

The noun referred to by the preposition. In "on the sofa", the preposition on refers to the prepositional noun, sofa.

SUFFIXES

A group of letters added to the end of a noun to create a different meaning (mountain/mountaineer, commune/communism).

UNCOUNTABLE

Things that can't be counted (hair, wind, sorrow).

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