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- "Elle porte des bottes rouge …
32 Comments
When you use more than one adjective to designate a single color (like "light blue," "dark green," etc.), neither of the adjectives changes according to the noun it modifies. For example:
"Il a les yeux bleu clair et les cheveux brun foncé."
"He has light blue eyes and dark brown hair."
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All languages have rules, some more than others. I imagine the rules as irritating insects, so we can apply lines by the mathematician Augustus De Morgan : "Great fleas have little fleas upon their backs to bite 'em | And little fleas have lesser fleas, and so ad infinitum".
Another sentence on here has something along the lines of "des gants violettes". So is the color plural there because it doesn't follow the double adjective rule?
Foncé means dark as in a dark color while sombre means to be gloomy. Par exemple,' il y a des bottes rouge foncé ' ' there are dark red boots ' ' Ceci est une sombre histoire du passé' 'This a dark story about the past' So, I hope this helps! Give a lingot please
Just to see what would happen I wrote "she is carrying dark red boots" and this was marked incorrect BUT would one not use the same sentence to describe a female who was carrying red boots???
Does anyone know what these things that look like likes and dislikes under everybodys comments do?
they allow your comment to go either up or down for those who read the discussion
- 2306
It is a way to register your agreement, i.e., "like", without having to add a comment such as "I agree", "me too", etc.
I don't understand why you want to complicate a fairly simple sentence. The word "some" is superfluous. After all, who says "I am wearing some boots"? Having said that, if you report it, it will probably be added to the accepted translations.
It is a part of the grammatical structure of French - articles are required - but they aren't in English so why add them in?
Because Duo is constantly forcing us to add small words that we don't use in casual speaking. The word 'that' for instance.
- 2306
While awkward sentences still creep in to Duolingo's exercises, it is not forcing anyone to use unnecessary words. The "des" in "des bottes" is used because it is the only way to express the idea of plural boots in French. In this sense, "des" is the plural of "un/une". There is no counterpart for this in English although some people have the mistaken idea that "des" must be translated as "some".
- 2306
"Des" is used (here) as the plural of "une". There is no counterpart in English. Some people have the idea that it must be translated as "some". That is not true. It is not absolute wrong but this sense of "some" is almost always ignored in English whereas "des" is absolutely required in French. So to reinforce Ripcurlgirl, avoid adding unnecessary words. Be aware that "some" has other meanings that get conflated with this one also. Consider "certain" or "quelque" as examples.
I don't believe that sombre is used with another adjective of colour to mean "dark". The adjective is always foncé
Because the French reads "des" not "les." It doesn't use the definitive article "the." So this would be interpreted as either "She [sometimes/habitually/frequently] wears dark red boots" or "She is [currently] wearing dark red boots."
- 953
If you want to emphasize the sentence with the definite article "the", add "les" to your sentence so it would be: Elle porte les bottes rouge foncé.
From what they explain farther up, the double adjectives becomes singular.
The pronunciation seems more like "Elle porte des gâteau de français". It is increadibly difficult to differenciate these sounds.
