"The children read the animals' names."

Translation: Les enfants lisent les noms des animaux.

[DuFarge]

Why can't it be "d'animaux'? Is this not done?

[bucko]

The possessive 'de' contracts with 'les' to form 'des'. Imagine the sentence was 'the children read the names of the animals', which word-for-word in French is 'les enfants lisent les noms de les animaux', but in reality the 'de' and 'les' contract.

[RLintner]

This sounds like something to remember...I thought there would be a difference between des - some - and de les - these ones in particular.

[farid.ouhmich]

"Les enfants lisent le nom des animaux" It is wrong?! We can say it?!

[wiredpsyche]

It should be "les noms", not "le nom".

[Gemobis]

Le nom pas les noms. Un animal = un nom

[laslliw]

The word "read" in English is both past and present tense

[hanjini]

Yes, it would easily be read as the past tense, ils ont lu

[Marc40947]

Je suis d'accord, cet phrase est ambiguë sans contexte et il pourrait traduire "Les enfants lisents ... " ou "Les enfants ont lu ..."

[Gemobis]

Les noms n'est pas faux, mais ici c'est du nom de chaque animal que l'on parle . Un animal , un nom