A postpositive adjective or postnominal adjective is an adjective that is placed after the noun or pronoun that it modifies, as in noun phrases such as attorney general, queen regnant, or all matters financial. This contrasts with prepositive adjectives, which come before the noun or pronoun, as in noun phrases such as red rose, lucky contestant, or busy bees.
In some languages (Spanish, Welsh, Indonesian, etc.), the postpositive placement of adjectives is the normal syntax, but in English it is largely confined to archaic and poetic uses (e.g. "Once upon a midnight dreary", as opposed to "Once upon a dreary midnight") as well as phrases borrowed from Romance languages or Latin (e.g. heir apparent, aqua regia) and certain fixed grammatical constructions (e.g. "Those anxious to leave soon exited").
In syntax, postpositive position is independent of predicative position; a postpositive adjective may occur either in the subject or the predicate of a clause, and any adjective may be a predicate adjective if it follows a copular verb. For example: monsters unseen were said to lurk beyond the moor (postpositive attribute in subject of clause), but the children trembled in fear of monsters unseen (postpositive attribute in predicate of clause) and the monsters, if they existed, remained unseen (predicate adjective in postpositive position).
Recognizing postpositive adjectives in English is important for determining the correct plural for a compound expression. For example, because martial is a postpositive adjective in the phrase court-martial, the plural is courts-martial, the suffix being attached to the noun rather than the adjective. This pattern holds for most postpositive adjectives, with the few exceptions reflecting overriding linguistic processes such as rebracketing.
Occurrence in languages
In certain languages, including French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Hebrew, Romanian, Arabic, Persian, Vietnamese, postpositive adjectives are the norm: it is normal for an attributive adjective to follow, rather than precede, the noun it modifies. The following example is from Italian, French and Spanish: il cavallo bianco, le cheval blanc, el caballo blanco, "the white horse" (literally "the horse white") In particular instances, however, such languages may also feature prepositive adjectives. In French, certain common adjectives, including grand ("big"), usually precede the noun, while in Italian and Spanish they can be prepositive or postpositive adjectives: le grand cheval, "the big horse" il grande cavallo, "the big horse", or il cavallo grande, "the big horse" (literally "the horse big") el gran caballo, "the big horse", or el caballo grande, "the big horse" (literally "the horse big") When an adjective can appear in both positions, the precise meaning may depend on the position. E.g. in French: un grand homme - "a great man" un homme grand - "a tall man" une fille petite - "a small girl" une petite fille - "a little girl" un petit chien - "a little dog (of a small breed)" un chien petit - "a small dog (for its breed)"
Prepositive and postpositive adjectives may occur in the same phrase: un bon vin blanc, un buon vino bianco, un buen vino blanco, "a good white wine" In many other languages, including English, German, Russian, Japanese and Chinese, prepositive adjectives are the norm (attributive adjectives normally come before the nouns they modify), and adjectives appear postpositively only in special situations, if at all.
In modern English
General uses
Compulsory
Adjectives must appear postpositively in English when they qualify almost all compound and some simple indefinite pronouns: some/any/no/every...thing/one/body/where, those; Examples: We need someone strong; those well-baked; Going anywhere nice?; Nothing important happened; Everyone new was shocked.
All adjectives are used postpositively for qualifying them precisely. The user follows the set formula: { |class=wikitable |(optional preposition)||(a if singular)||noun||this||adjective||. (or verb/preposition and continuation) |} This can be replaced by that or so, or, casually to evoke an affected air, yea. Without the preposition the formula is even more intuitive in replies. Examples pointing: "Which of the greyhounds do you like?" "Dogs this big." "A dog that weighty would definitely fit the bill." "A dog that tall to match my friend's." Examples figuratively: "A dog so fast it could win at the track".