Capital letters - grammar - central - British Council

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grammar

Capital letters

Double-click on any word and see its definition from Cambridge Dictionaries Online.

English sentences always begin with a capital letter.

We saw the accident from a distance.
The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog.

The personal pronoun "I" is always written with a capital letter, wherever in a sentence it comes:

I like horror films.
Jenny and I went to the beach together.

Apart from these cases, capital letters are used at the beginning of the following types of words:

Names of people and places

Peter
Susan
Australia
Hyde Park
the Middle East

Planets and stars can be considered as places:

Jupiter
Pluto
Alpha Centauri

Titles

Mr Finnegan
Mrs Edgeware
Ms Johnson
Dr Jacobs
Major Fingleton
the Director General

Days, months and public holidays

Monday
Friday
July
December
Christmas
Ramadan
Yom Kippur

Nationalities and regions, languages, religions and ethnic groups

a German car
the Scandinavian countries
She speaks Russian and Chinese
a Muslim cleric
the Aboriginal people

Titles of books, magazines, films, songs, etc.

War and Peace
Rolling Stone
the New Statesman
Citizen Kane
Stairway to Heaven
the Mouse Trap

Notice that articles, prepositions, conjunctions, etc. are not usually capitalised.

More information on capital letters:

Quizzes and exercises on capital letters:

DCSIMG

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