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- "The children eat the soup."
"The children eat the soup."
Translation:Les enfants mangent la soupe.
59 Comments
L' is an "elided" definite article, replacing "le" or "la" when the following word starts with a vowel of a non-aspirated H: l'ami (masc), l'homme (masc), l'habitude (fem).
Le is the masculine singular definite pronoun: the boy = le garçon
La is the feminine singular definite pronoun: the girl = la fille
Les is the masculine or feminine plural definite pronoun: the boys = les garçons (masc), the girls = les filles (fem)
Conjugation. When you see je"you put mange. And then it goes on like: Tu manges, il/elle/on mange, nous mangeons, vous mangez, ils/elles mangent. These are the present tense verbs. If you want the rest, go to the link at the bottom. It may be confusing, so I don't think you should look at it yet at level 4. I learned this in school a year ago and I still remember :)
1362
dcront
If you are talking about the example given at the top of this page, the context is given. It is the soup. There is no doubt, in English, whether that means the soup or some soup.
Therefore there is no doubt in the French. It is la soupe.
I think that if you hover on "manges/mangent", you get the conjugation of the verb. Conjugations in French are more extensive than in English and verb endings change with almost every type of subject:
je mange, tu manges, il/elle/on mange, nous mangeons, vous mangez (polite singular or plural), ils/elles mangent.
1362
l'enfant = the child
les enfants = the children
l'homme = the man
les hommes = the men
l'hommes = incorrect.
firstly it is les hommes
because children is plural, it is only ' to stop the tension between the two vowels side by side, for example try saying le, homme, bearing in mind that the h is silent so it would be pronounced ommay, you will notice if you try to say it fast, it will end up sounding like l'ommay, hence l'homme
so back to your original question, because it is plural les would be used so there is no vowel tension, it is easy to say les enfants, it is done for the same reason that we say an orange and not just a orange (try saying it)
Hope this helps!
This is the best course of action when a translation of yours is rejected and you don't understand why:
- You carefully read the correct translation suggested by the system.
- You click on "discuss the sentence" and you carefully read the thread until you find an explanation for your mistake.
- If your question has not been answered yet, you can post your question and give all details so that other users can help you, starting with the type of exercise you had to do.
As already explained on this thread, "the soup" is specific (not "some soup"), therefore, in French, you will need the matching definite article "la soupe".
"De la soupe" would be correct if the sentence were "the children eat soup".