Meaning of rendere
In today’s post, we’re going to focus on one of the meanings of the word rendere.
Rendere is one of those words that has several meanings.
However, we want to focus on its most commonly used meaning.
Have a look at the sentence below to get an idea of what it could mean:
La musica rende tutto più facile!
Music makes everything easier!
Let’s find out how to use “rendere” in Italian!
What does “rendere” mean?
As we already mentioned, rendere has several meanings.
If you go through all the definitions of the word rendere and then check the meanings of the English word “to render”, you will notice many similarities.
This is because rendere (and “to render) comes from the Latin word reddere, which means “to give back/to return”.
In fact, one of the meanings of rendere is “to give back”, as in:
Gli ho reso il libro che mi aveva prestato.
I gave him back the book he had lent me.
However, we’d like to concentrate on another meaning.
Here it is:
- rendere means “to cause to be or to become”
It’s pretty similar to one of the meanings of the English word “render”:
- To render means “to cause someone or something to be in a particular state”
Here’s an example:
Lucia sa come rendere felice la sua famiglia.
Lucia knows how to make her family happy.
Conjugation of rendere
Let’s have a look at the conjugation of rendere in the present indicative:
| io | rendo |
| tu | rendi |
| lui/lei | rende |
| noi | rendiamo |
| voi | rendete |
| loro | rendono |
The past participle is irregular and is: reso/resa/resi/rese, depending on the number and gender.
Rendere + adjective
Let’s have a look at this sentence again:
Lucia sa come rendere felice la sua familia.
Lucia knows how to make her family happy.
As you can see, we said “rendere felice”.
Felice (happy) is an adjective.
Adjectives are words that describe people, things, places, ideas, etc.
We usually follow this structure:
- Conjugated form of rendere + someone/something + adjective
Or this one:
- Conjugated form of rendere + adjective + someone/something
Here are some common adjectives we usually use after rendere:
- rendere facile (to make happy)
- rendere difficile (to make diffcult)
- rendere semplice (to make simple)
- rendere normale (to make normal)
- rendere felice (to make happy)
- rendere contento (to make happy)
- rendere triste (to make sad)
- rendere impossibile (to make impossible)
- rendere possibile (to make possible)
- rendere pubblico (to make public)
- rendere visibile (to make visible)
- rendere forte (to make strong)
Let’s look at some examples:
Stai rendendo la situazione molto difficile!
You’re making this situation very difficult!
I ministri hanno reso pubblico e disponibile il documento ufficiale.
Ministers made the official document public and available.
Mi rende la vita impossibile!
She makes my life impossible!
When to use mi rende, ti rende, etc.
You could also use one of the following pronouns if you want to refer to someone without saying their names:
- mi, ti, la/lo, ci, vi, li/le
Here are some examples:
Lei mi rende tanto felice!
She makes me so happy!
Ci rende molto triste questa cosa.
This thing makes us very sad.
Li ho resi disponibili.
I made them available.
Practice with Quizlet
Here's a set of flashcards and quizzes to practice this grammar topic.Set phrases with rendere
There are some common set phrases with the word rendere.
- Rendere l’idea
Rendere l’idea means “to be able to convey an idea; to explain a concept in an effective way; to be able to make oneself understood”.
Questo esempio rende l’idea di ciò che voglio dire.
This example conveys the idea of what I want to say.
- Rendere conto (a qualcuno di qualcosa)
Rendere conto a qualcuno di qualcosa means “to give an explanation to justify something to someone”
Mi dovrai rendere conto delle tue decisioni.
You will have to explain your decisions to me.
- Rendersi conto
Rendersi means “to realize” and is a reflexive verb, which means it always goes together with one of the following pronouns: mi, ti, si, ci, vi, si.
Non mi ero reso conto.
I hadn’t realized.
Ti rendi conto di quello che dici?
Do you realize what you’re saying?
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