Identify the Adjective Clause in the following sentence.
"The spot where the battle was fought is unknown".
Answer & explanation
Correct answer: option 3
The correct answer is Option (3) → The spot where the battle was fought
An adjective is a word that describes a noun or a pronoun, for example a tall tree, the food is tasty.
Note: The given answer is as per the official NTA Answer Key. However, there appears to be a discrepancy in the key: the correct answer should be Option (2) → where the battle was fought, as explained below.
Adjective clause:
- A clause is a group of words with its own subject and verb.
- An adjective clause does the work of an adjective: it describes a noun and begins with a relative word such as who, which, that, where, when.
- In this sentence the noun "spot" is described by "where the battle was fought" (subject "the battle", verb "was fought"). The noun itself is not part of the clause.
Option 1: The spot where — Incorrect. It joins the noun to the first word of the clause and leaves out the clause's subject and verb.
Option 2: where the battle was fought — Should be Correct. (Incorrect as per NTA) This is the complete adjective clause: it begins with "where", has its own subject and verb, and describes the noun "spot".
Option 3: The spot where the battle was fought — Should be Incorrect. (But this is the correct answer in the NTA Answer Key.) This is the whole subject of the sentence: the noun "The spot" together with the clause that describes it. A noun is not part of the adjective clause that qualifies it.
Option 4: the battle was — Incorrect. It drops the relative word "where" and the participle "fought", so it is only a broken piece of the clause.
Contrast: the adjective clause is only "where the battle was fought". "The spot where the battle was fought" adds the noun it describes and is the whole subject of the sentence.
Advice for the exam: In the real exam, mark the answer that is grammatically or factually correct. If NTA’s provisional answer key marks a different option, challenge it during the answer-key challenge window and give the reason in one or two lines.