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- Topic: German >
- "Those are small."
"Those are small."
Translation:Die da sind klein.
23 Comments
Can someone guide me to understand this sentence. I wrote Das sind Kleine and got wrong. Thanks in advance
686
Steve32837 has correctly identified the problem with kleine. As for the subject of your sentence, in this challenge die Eule is teaching a different construction to indicate "those". We use die to indicate plurality. The da works with it to provide additional specificity. If you're familiar with the colloquial phrasing "that there", die da might make more sense (reference the comment from Adrian.fagan).
If Crocodile Dundee were discussing einige Messer:
"Das ist groß. Die da sind klein." ["This is big. Those are small."]
- 446
"Kleine" is wrong because an adjective alone doesn't need an extra "e" at the end, so it should be "klein". As for the beginning of your sentence, I'm not sure why its wrong.
- 231
Because das is singular, it would have to be Die sind klein and that is accepted. Die da & Die dort would also be fine but not necessary.
Not yet. But I tried "Dies sind klein" and it was accepted. I wonder why. I thought it meant "these are small".
- 612
There is no location information in the English sentence to prompt the "da" in German. Perhaps the English sentence should use a more colloquial "those there are small"/ "those over there are small", or maybe this translation should only be asked from German to English. In any case, "das sind klein" is a translation of the given English sentence and should be accepted.
"small" is used in this source sentence as an adjective and not as a nominalization (as you suggested) as in "das sind die Kleinen". Also, the verb is in the plural form which is not reflected in your suggestion. More on this here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nominalization
"Das sind klein" not accepted? I saw they used "Das" with "sind" usually, why can't I?
Why, if "Das sind klein" is incorrect, is that the top suggestion on the hints? Duolingo's hints seems to be less and less correct. Reported 27 Sep 2019
- 1568
I think (don't quote me) that it's die because it's plural (sind). You would normally use die for plural 'the'. Someone native could shed some light on the issue?
- 559
I'm assuming this is about context; the person would be gesturing to something near by. I interpret this sentence as "that there is small", improper English, but maybe it makes sense in German.
- 507
Duo's hints: "Those are" -> "Das sind" "Small" -> "Klein" ergo "Das sind klein" should be correct. A lot of other sentences of the form "Those are X" are accepted with "Das sind X". Reported 1/23/2020.
I am not certain,but here is what I think. By "those", they mean it is plural. "Die" is "the" for plural nouns. "Da" means "there"(I think). So "Die da", I'm guessing, [Noun(Plural)]over there(is small). Please don't correct me if I am wrong.
