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- Topic: Portuguese >
- "O gato bebe o seu leite."
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I keep missing questions regarding this extra "o." What does it mean and when does it belong?
Some languages use the definite article in places where other languages don't. In this case, "o" is optional.
"O" is the definite article masculine singular.
How do I know whether it's "yours" or "its"? Is this just a context thing?
If it is "teu", you can be sure it is "your".
But if it is "seu", only context will answer that. Of course in this simple sentence, there's only the cat and the milk. So..."its".
What if you are speaking to someone else who has milk and the cat suddenly jumps on the table and starts to drink it? I don't think that the sentence necessarily gives the needed context.
I wrote "its" and the program said i have a typo, with "its" underlined. Was it supposed to be "your"? Or "his" ? Or... HOW do you know?
While studying Portuguese I was taught that in order to avoid confusion with seu meaning "yours" or "his" to assume that "seu" means yours and use dele when referring to his. For instance: o gato bebe o leite dele.
Can anyone else confirm this?
That's a nice rule, and as a native speaker that is how I would say it ("o leite dele"), but it's not a rule of the language. It's perfectly acceptable to write "o seu leite" and the reader would then be left to figure out whose milk it is based on context.
I am going to trie to explain:
I - my, mine It is my car The car is mine É o meu carro O carro é meu
You - your, yours It is your car The car is yours É o seu carro O carro é seu
He - his, him It is his car The car is him È o carro dele O carro é dele
She - her, her It is her car The car is her É o carro dela O carro é dela
It - its in Portuguese it is used for animals and not for humans
"The cat drinks its milk" and no "The cat drinks your milk"
We - our, ours It is our car The car is ours É o nosso carro O carro é nosso
They - their, theirs It is their car The car is their É o carro deles O carro é deles
Excuse my English.
What is wrong with "the cat drinks his milk"? Perfactly good English, and we know it's a masculine cat.
I thought you use the article "o" if the noun is omitted. likeee "Bebe o seu leite" you need the "o" because there is no noun. But since the sentence has "o gato" i thought we could ommit it. I'm so confused
Milk is the noun. Did you mean to say there is no pronoun? (Your, his, its...)
There IS NO context. Earlier in the lesson, a sentence was " O gato bebe seu leite." This one says "O gato bebe o seu leite." Both were correct. Are they its milk? Your milk? His milk? There is no more conversation in these sentences to give a context.
"It's" is the contraction for "it is."
"Its" is the correct form for the possessive. The cat drinks its milk.
do i really need the second "o" is this? is it wrong to say "o gato bebe seu leite."?
What's the difference between 1."O gato bebe o seu leite." and 2."O gate bebe seu leite." Because I put 2 in and it said the correct answer was 1.
I think im understanding the use & placement of articles now. From my interpreted understanding, the following:
The cat drinks it's milk. = O gato bebe o seu leite.
The cat drinks your milk. = O gato bebe seu leite.
The difference here is that the "it's" - this is the possessive, so the sentence depends on the context.
The other rule is the ommission of the noun:
Teu carro é bom, o meu não é bom. = Your car is good, mine is not good.
Because the second part of the above sentence omits the noun, you have to include the "o".
Is that correct?
Cats should not drink milk. I think it would be less harmful if they used some other beverage in the sentence, like water or something more obviously absurd such as urine or cola or gasoline, instead of reinforcing human habits that harm animals. In the same way that having the app constantly telling me that the dog eats chocolate might be harmful.
