"The cats are on the couches."
Translation:I gatti sono sui divani.
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I didn't know the plural for sofa so I put divani. What is the plural of sofa in Italian?
Typically words with a stress on the last letter (parole tronche) are invariable, e.g. tribù (tribe/tribes), proprietà (property/properties), tè (tea/teas). So the plural of "il sofà" is "i sofà".
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It would not be sulle because "sulle" is the feminine form - su + le. Sofà is masculine. That's why it is il sofà / i sofà. So you would need the su + i contraction which is sui. Therefore "sui sofà."
the sofa = il sofà or il divano
the sofas = i sofà or i divani
in italian the words with the stress on the last syllable are invariable from the singular form to the plural form
the city, the cities = la città, le città
the tribe, the tribes = la tribù, le tribù
the igloo, the igloos = l'iglù, gli iglù
What is esprime? It's offered as a hint for couches, but I can't find the word in my dictionary.
Esprime is a verb form of esprimere, here meaning "to couch, to say indirectly" but more directly translated as "to express". Duo's hints here do not refer to this exercise and are misleading.
I put i gatti sono sul sofa and it was incorrect. Why not "sul" but "sui"?
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I put 'divani' for couches, and it marked me right, but it is not one of the options, and in fact all the options are words I haven't heard of or come across. What's the idea behind this thinking??
I thought it was divani and went with one of the suggestions as I thought I was wrong. This is one of the weak spots of Duolingo. I've left this site many times because they won't fix errors like these.
What is the different between "i gatti " and "le gatte"? Is it the same as i ragazzi and le ragazze
I gatti are all male or mixed gender cats. Le gatte would only work if all of the cats are female. So yes, just like le ragazze.
How do you use the words divano and sofà - what is the distinction between the furniture. Or are they totally interchangeable? In English we have couch, sofa, settee etc.
They are completely interchangeable, I read that divani is used more often than sofà
Hi, I guess I'm lost here... I thought that before s/z words and vogals I should use "gli" instead of "i". So it would be sugli sofà instead of sui sofà. Can someone help?
Not before s. Before masculine words beginning with s plus a consonant. Thus la strada becomes le strade, but lo stivalo become gli stivali
Very interesting that sul (on singular) becomes sui (for plural) In Francese, the word for on (sur) doesn't change with the object of the sentence
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Yes, although that is comparing the Italian->English "on the" to the French->English "on". Sul and sui are combined forms of su + li and of su + i. In French the sur and the definite article that follows stay apart. It is the definite article that changes with the object, in both languages.
To recap: (Italian) su = (French) sur
(Italian) Su combined with any of il, la, lo, gli i, le = (French) sur and then separately any of le, la, les
if it is IN (nei) the couch, not ON (sui) it, it is probably destroying the stuffing, as mine did!
Because any cat is on top of the couch, so that calls for the most literal meaning of "su" :)
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Sui is better:
Sopra is (somewhere) above (the couches).
Sui is (resting right) on top of (the couches).
Why not " I gatti sono sui divani"? ....sopra i divani means ...over the couches. Cats my certainly be all over the places!
Translation: "I gatti sono sui divani." (Not sure why you're asking why not this--this is the DL translation provided)?
Can someone explain to me why "sofa" is considered masculine? It is just because il dovano means the same thing (sofa/couch)?
I am not really sure what you are asking, but Italian nouns have gender and divano is masculine. There is also an Italian word sofà which is also masculine .
Im incredibly confused on how Italian sentences are verbally structured - do Italians have to really think ahead before phrasing every single sentence or is speaking Italian incorrectly more forgiving when using the wrong plural or singular words in a full sentence?
E.g. in order to use "i gatti" i would have to know first hand, that I need to use the words "sui divani" at the end of the sentence, otherwise I could have incorrectly used "le gatte sono" and only once I've reached the end of the sentence realise i infact need to end my sentence with "sui divani", making my entire verbal sentence: "le gatte sono sui divani" and grammatically incorrect.
I hope im making sense? Writing Italian gives the advantage of going back and correcting errora but the same cannot be applied to speaking - so is it more common/acceptable to use the wrong purals/singular words when speaking? *Nov 2020
The subject and object in a sentence don't need to agree, don't worry! I don't think Duo ever explained this but "gatto" is for a male cat and "gatta" a female cat! You can't do this with all animal words, but there are a few that do change ending for the gender. Like how some jobs do- "architetto" for a male architect and "architetta" for a female. So you'd use "i gatti" for male cats (or a mix of male and female) and "le gatte" for female cats :)
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Su + i => sui, which already includes the i.
You can look into this more by delving into the subject of prepositions combining with definite articles.
If the plural of sofaS is divani then why not forget the use of sofa and just use the divano and its plurals. This is so confusing!