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- Topic: Italian >
- "L'uomo cena."
82 Comments
It's idomatic.
Cena is being used as a verb in this case - and it means "to dine/to eat dinner/to have dinner". It's a bit confusing because the third person singular form of the verb "cenare" (the form you use with lui/lei/it/the man/etc) is identical to the noun "il cena" which means "the dinner".
363
That makes sense, but then, again, pranza is also being used as a verb "pranzare" so the same should apply.
- 509
He means pranzare is used to say to eat lunch so the same should apply to cenare to say to eat dinner.
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Weird, I put that and it was incorrect. Extra weird is that the previous question was identical but spoken by the female voice, and I had typed the same thing and got it right.
because that would be l'uomo mangia, whereas here he is specifically eating dinner, not just eating.
Maybe for an English native person it's kinda difficult to understand this phrase, but some things like "dining" or "eats" is not correct because this phrase takes "cena" as a verb, and "dine" is the literal traduction for "cena" as an action
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I miss the times when we used to lose hearts even though it pissed me off every single time it happened (whether it was a typo, unacceptable translation or simply my mistake).
Where are you bringing the 'is' from? The man is dining would be "l'uomo è cena"
Actually, that would be "The man is dinner." The present progressive in Italian would be more like "L'uomo sta cenando."
Here cena would mean " Have dinner"? I thought has would be "ha". So does the translation "L'uomo ha la cena" also hold correct? (Where cena would be a noun rather than a verb)
No, not really. When we say in English "The man is having dinner," we mean that he is eating his evening meal (unless you live in one of those places where "dinner" refers to the midday meal, but that's another issue). In Italian, that is simply "L'uomo cena." The verb "cenare" means "to have dinner" or "to eat dinner" or (in more stilted language) "to dine." In sriram385's sentence "L'uomo ha la cena" the word "ha" means "has" in the sense of possessing dinner, not consuming it. So you might theoretically hear one waiter asking another waiter if a customer has received his dinner yet, and the second waiter would answer "Si, l'uomo ha la cena," but that just means that the dinner is on the table in front of the man, not that he is eating it.
L'uomo mangia la cena is also valid. Maybe you misspelled "mangia"?
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The tool tip for cena said "(he/she/it) eats (one's) dinner", so I wrote "The man eats his dinner" and was marked wrong. How come?
Duo wants us to be more literal, how do you know that it is his dinner? It doesn't say
I had never seen this word so I clicked it and it said it means eat but then I was told I was wrong.. Ok
I put "L'uomo cena" for the opposite question earlier and got incorrect answer with correction being "L'uomo la cena".
Hm. That might mean "The man dines on it", but that still adds more than was there. I'd report that as a glitch.
No, because that is not specific enough. "Cenare" means specifically "to dine", or "to eat dinner".
io pranzo for lunch, io ceno for dinner.
Pranzare is the infinitive:
I eat lunch = io pranzo
you eat lunch = tu pranzi
he/she eats lunch = lui/lei pranza
we eat lunch = noi pranziamo
you eat lunch = voi pranzate
they eat lunch = loro pranzano
Cenare
I eat dinner = io ceno
you eat dinner = tu ceni
he/she eats dinner = lui/lei cena
we eat dinner = noi ceniamo
you eat dinner = voi cenate
they eat dinner = loro cenano
I think the best translation is 'he has dinner' and not 'he eats dinner'
Depends on which dialect you speak. Where I live, lunch is the mid-day meal, dinner is the evening meal, and tea is an alternative to coffee.
Have you tried "dines"? Not many people use "sup" anymore, which is probably why the Italian team hasn't added it.
Speech recognition software still has a long way to go. You can always disable the microphone option in your settings.
I have been called wrong in the past when saying, "lui pranza" meant "he eats lunch." I thought maybe it was because "mangia" wasn't bring used and it meant, "he has lunch." Usually, when "cena" is used as a verb, I use "dine" and it's perfectly acceptable. On this particular question, I get dinged. Am I wrong or the program? I tend to think I'm wrong.
I figured out what i did wrong. I said "men" instead of "man." Autocorrect strikes again! What the me off was the correction used the word "eats" and i thought that was unacceptable because I was marked wrong saying that for lunch one time.
Your keybiard in the screen forces Ch ck, when I am only trying ti change ABC to /*-+%
I've heard "to dine" and "to sup", but I don't think "to supper" is a verb.
