We know that adjectives are words that modify (or describe) nouns , such as the word red in “ the red jacket ,” or the word beautiful in “ that girl is beautiful .” 

Nominal adjectives , on the other hand, are adjectives that perform the function of a noun in a sentence . They are preceded by the word   'the' and can be found as the subject or the object of a sentence or clause .

Examples of nominal adjectives are:

• the young
• the old  �
• the sick �
• the wealthy
• the blind  �
• the innocent �

A major subclass of nominal adjectives refers to nationalities :

• the French  �
• the British  �
• the Japanese �

However, not all nationalities have corresponding nominal adjectives . Many of them are denoted by plural, proper nouns :

• the Germans �
• the Russians
• the Americans �
• the Poles  �

Nominal adjectives do not refer exclusively to classes of people . Indeed some of them do not denote classes at all:

• the opposite �
• the contrary �
• the good �

Comparative and superlative forms can also be nominal adjectives :

• the best  is yet to come
• the elder  of the two
• the greatest  of these
• the most important  among them

We refer to all of these types as nominal adjectives because they share some of the characteristics of nouns (hence ` nominal ') and some of the characteristics of adjectives.

These nominal adjectives have the following 'nominal' characteristics:

• they are preceded by a determiner (usually the definite article the )
• they can be modified by adjectives (the gallant French , the unfortunate poor )

These nominal adjectives also have the following 'adjectival' features:

• they are gradable (the very old , the extremely wealthy )
• many can take comparative and superlative forms (the poorer , the poorest )