# Country adjectives and language names: how do we decide to add -ese, -ian, etc?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/country-adjectives-and-language-names-how-do-we-decide-to-add-ese-ian-etc/354657>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [April 28, 2006, 9:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/country-adjectives-and-language-names-how-do-we-decide-to-add-ese-ian-etc/354657 "2006-04-28T21:23:55Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Sunspace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunspace/32/1250_2.png) [@Sunspace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunspace)\
**Post date:** [April 28, 2006, 9:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/country-adjectives-and-language-names-how-do-we-decide-to-add-ese-ian-etc/354657/1 "2006-04-28T21:23:55Z")

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What governs the endings we put on country adjectives and language names?

Japan -\> Japanese, Malta -\> Maltese, France -\> French, Belgium -\> Belgian, Spain -\> Spanich, etc? If we say Japan and Japanese, why don’t we say Iran and Iranese? England -\> English, but Iceland -\> Icelandic. In English we say Canadian, but in Italian it’s Canadese.

What’s the rule here?

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**Author:** ![FatBaldGuy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ecd19e/32.png) [@FatBaldGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FatBaldGuy)\
**Post date:** [April 28, 2006, 9:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/country-adjectives-and-language-names-how-do-we-decide-to-add-ese-ian-etc/354657/2 "2006-04-28T21:25:11Z")

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There is no rule.