"Our cats are not white."
Translation:Le nostre gatte non sono bianche.
27 Comments
I never saw 'le gatte'. I do know that 'i gatti' is the plural form of 'il gatto'. Is 'le gatte' the plural form of 'la gatta', a feminine cat?
So just to be super clear about this, (I have a male and a female cat) would I say
when I see my male cat, il mio gatto,
and when I see my female cat, la mia gatta?
Also, following convention, if I have a bunch of cats female and male, must I say, i miei gatti?
No, there are some that have only one gender:
- il serpente = the snake
- la tigre = the tiger
Sorry to revive an old thread but, as a general rule, does this mean most animals can be written in masculine and feminine depending on the actual physical gender of the animal in question?
i.e. Squalo/Squala
880
yes, but as @dnovinc said, some animals (perhaps most) only have one grammatical gender.
if you want to specify the physical gender you have to say:
- Lo squalo maschio/Lo squalo femmina (" ̶L̶a̶ ̶s̶q̶u̶a̶l̶a̶" doesn't exist)
- il serpente maschio/il serpente femmina (L̶a̶ ̶s̶e̶r̶p̶e̶n̶t̶e̶)
- La tigre maschio/La tigre femmina (i̶l̶ ̶t̶i̶g̶r̶e̶)
There were two correct answers to this one. The above answer and "I nostri gatti non sono bianchi". We had to be careful to match the gatte or gatti with the corresponding bianche or bianchi. I get caught by this and am learning to be more aware of it.
I selected both "le gatte…" and "i gatti…" It was marked wrong, and "i gatti" was said to be the only correct answer. Now, at the top of this comments page, it shows "le gatte" as correct. I still think either is ok.
Ok, my mistake. Le gatte had another error which I missed. So it appears both forms are correct.
Well, I haven't come across anything saying both genders are correct in Italian.
So why then did I get I gatti wrong, if I don't know the gender of the cats, and it is still correct otherwise?
If you meant that literally then the answer is because:
our cats = i nostri gatti (or le nostre gatte if you were specifically talking about all female cats)
- 178
The word "sono" is used with both io and loro. "Io sono" (English - I am) , "loro sono" (they are). The word "sei" is the conjugation used with tu, 2nd person singular informal in Italian. "Tu sei" (English - you are). To further complicate matters, the pronoun is usually left out in Italian unless you are emphasizing the person doing the action. So, I am = sono and also they are = sono, you are = sei. Sorry this is so long! :)
I like the part of your explanation when you said, to further complicate matters.. ^_^ but, nonetheless, thank you for helping me understand.
(our cats) are they not male and female?????? I'm confused with duo lingo
If it's more than one cat, how can gatte be correct? And I thought the color had to match singular or plural, as well as gender.
"Le gatte" means The cats when all of the cats are female. i gatti is used for multiple male cats or for a mix of both male and female cats. Yes, the color does usually match singular/plural as well as the gender. Le gatte sono bianche is correct (so long as all the cats are female)
I mean le gatte sono bianche is an example of a grammatically correct sentence (not that it's the correct answer to this question)
Surely there is nothing in this phrase to indicate the sex of the cats,so why am I incorrect in I nostri gatti?
I typed ( as I didn't know if the cats were male or female ) i nosti gatti non sono bianchi
This was accepted but I was told I had a typo.
The given answer was in the above female form but I can't spot my typo in the male form. Is there a typo or is DL just being pedantic because I wasn't psychic enough to realise it wanted girl cats in stead of boy cats? :D
