"Your mothers are old."

Translation: Vos mères sont âgées.

[gtmckee]

Why is it incorrect to use "vieux" here instead of agées?

[K.Alix]

Vieux is used for objects. Humans would use âgé(e).

[Le_Lapin_Agile]

Not always so. An old man = un vieil homme, for instance.

[ZuzanaLagova]

or "Maigret et la vieille dame" by Georges Simenon

[Sarah21189]

Wish I could give you a lingot for that... I'm on mobile

[BillofKempsey]

or anciennes?

[Vive-Le-Francais]

It was marked wrong. The dictionary definition of the adjective "ancienne" when used of a person means that they are no longer living, and this is not what the given sentence means.

[BillofKempsey]

Thanks. I must remember not to use it in conversation!

[MaggiePye]

I've also seen it with people to mean "former" (like "the former mayor"), even when they're still alive but just not performing that role any longer.

But it's definitely not what this sentence calls for.

[InvertedGo]

If "ancien" is placed before the noun it means "former" if it is placed after the noun it means "old" (and possibly "antique").

[gtmckee]

Thank you, that makes sense.

[BlackSea]

Actually, there's nothing wrong with it.

une vieille dame

http://dictionnaire.reverso.net/francais-anglais/vieux

In fact, I'm not sure if "agees" means old or older...

[Raul_Duke]

Google Ngram seems to agree with you here: http://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=vieille+dame%2Cdame+%C3%A2g%C3%A9e%2C&year_start=1800&year_end=2000&corpus=19&smoothing=3&share=

[PeaceJoyPancakes]

"Vieux" is masculine. You would need "vieilles".

[LeonardoPolly]

AFAIK, vieux is kind of rude. Still, since mères is a feminine plural noun, vielles should be used

[jstnes]

Can someone help explain when to use vos vs. votre? Or how to not get them confused? Thank you in advance :)

[RamananR.V]

Vos is the plural of votre. So, for example, votre mere vs vos meres.

[JMaxGlobal]

Can't we also say "tes mères" ?

[MaggiePye]

You can, if you are talking to a single person who has more than one mother.

[JMaxGlobal]

Which might be a somewhat unconventional family arrangement - although certainly not impossible. Thanks for the clarification.
Cheers, Max.

[Sarah21189]

Could be the child of a lesbian couple.

[Maltagerr]

whats wrong with "tes mamans sont agees"?

[MaggiePye]

"Tes mamans" isn't a good translation for "your mothers." "Maman" is what people call their mothers; in English, because there are so many possibilities, it has a lot of possible translations: Mom, Mum, Mommy, Mummy, Mam[m]a, Ma...

I might use "tes mamans" when talking to a child (I know a lot of kids who have two moms, so it's something I actually do use in both French and English) but in that case, the English would be "your moms" or "your mommies" (Heather a deux mamans) rather than "your mothers."

[Ruby360784]

"Your MOTHERS are old" How forward thinking of duo (i'm sorry it had to be said)

[Shaiyan_1]

Can I put votre in place of vos?

[PeaceJoyPancakes]

No, it has to be the plural "vos" (or "tes") because "mothers" is plural.