A2 · Fine points and style
Capitals and punctuation
Your quotation marks are not used here, and dialogue opens with a dash.
At a glance
- Remember
- Only the country is capitalised.
- Form
- portuguêsPortuguese (lower case)
- Signal words
- português
- janeiro
- segunda-feira
- «»
- Trap
- Wrong:Em Janeiro falo Português.Right:Em janeiro falo português.
Your turn
5 exercises on this topic. Your answers are checked in the browser; none of them leaves your device.
Now write it yourself4 sentences on this topic, typed and checked instantly.
The form
The forms and what they mean
Each row gives the meaning first, then the form in Portuguese.
| Portuguese (lower case) | português |
| Portugal (capital) | Portugal |
| Monday (lower case) | segunda-feira |
| January (lower case) | janeiro |
| a number, point and comma | 1.250,50 € |
| direct speech | «Vens?» |
The rules one by one
The form this topic is about
Languages and nationalities are lower case.
Ele fala português e alemão.He speaks Portuguese and German.
Weekdays and months are lower case.
Chego na segunda-feira, em março.I arrive on Monday, in March.
The country takes a capital.
Vivo em Portugal há dois anos.I have lived in Portugal for two years.
The decimal mark is a comma.
Custa 1.250,50 euros.It costs 1,250.50 euros.
Example sentences
Estudo português às terças e quintas.I study Portuguese on Tuesdays and Thursdays.
Em agosto está tudo fechado.In August everything is closed.
«Onde moras?», perguntou ela.« Where do you live? » she asked.
O bilhete custa 12,50 €.The ticket costs 12.50 euros.
The trap English speakers fall into
Watch out
The capital on a month or a language is the reflex that survives longest, because English capitalises both and the calendar turns up in every other message. Em Janeiro and falo Português are both wrong. Only the country is capitalised — the person never, not even as a noun: um português.
The full explanation
Read it all · about 1 min
Languages, nationalities, weekdays and months are written in lower case: português, alemão, segunda-feira, janeiro. English capitalises all four, so this is four reflexes to unlearn rather than one rule to learn.
Only the country itself takes a capital: Portugal, a Alemanha. The person stays lower case, as a noun as well as a property: um português, os alemães, ele é português. The decimal mark is a comma: 12,50 €. Thousands are separated by a full stop — 1.250,50 €, the reverse of English — or, as the standard prefers, by a thin space.
Direct speech takes angle quotes, «Vens?», perguntou ele, and the marks you would type — the double ones on your keyboard — are not the Portuguese ones. In a dialogue, each new speaker opens with a dash instead: — Estou pronto.
So a page of Portuguese fiction has almost no quotation marks on it at all, while a page of English fiction is full of them. The angle quotes are kept for quoting inside a sentence, which is the one job English also gives them.
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