If you know French could you help? Please?
Okay… I’ve been learning French for some time and I know my basic grammar and whatnot. However, there is one thing which has always never failed to baffle me. It’s regarding the noun for water: “eau”
I know that it’s a feminine noun, which would mean that you’d have things like “la pollution de l’eau” (water pollution) or “la fête de l’eau” (celebration of water) because it’s “de la” and not “du”.
However, why is “a bottle of water” known as “une bouteille d’eau” and not “une bouteille de l’eau”? It doesn’t seem to make any sense to me. I’ve been searching on the net and haven’t been able to come up with any straight answers to this. Is this an exception to the rule or am I missing something here? And is this present in any other cases in this otherwise beautiful language?
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12 Answers
First off, i know nothing of French.
But couldn’t the bottle be male, no matter what is inside it?
The bottle being the main subject in the sentence?
I do not speak French, but my father does, and he says that French is full of exceptions which could be why some Frenchmen consider themselves exceptional and what he terms “quirks.”
@rebbel Nope. “Bottle” in French is feminine. So that’s a deadend there. Thanks for trying anyways!
@Darwin That might be the case, but then again, apparently English has way more exceptions than French and is much harder to learn as a second language (I feel so lucky I know English as a first language!)
The “de (noun)...” (or “d’...”) form is used in cases where one is talking about a quantity of something (e.g. un kilo de tomates, une bouteille d’eau, beaucoup d’animaux, etc) or in cases of negation (e.g. il n’y a pas de pain, je ne fais jamais d’erreurs).
So whereas you would say “donne moi du gâteau, s’il te plaît”, you would say “donne moi une part de gâteau, s’il te plaît”, because now you’re talking about a quantity.
@Harp My gosh that makes perfect sense… I was looking at more stuff on the net and was starting to make some mental connections, but your answer just made everything click. It’s interesting how I never thought of “bottle” as a quantity.. Shall keep that in mind. Merci beaucoup mon ami de Fluther!
To confuse matters even further, a cup of tea is une tasse de thé, and a teacup is
une tasse à thé. When ordering, however, one would just say, un thé, svp.
And if you insist on translating (a bad idea), donne moi du gâteau _ means “give me some cake” and _donne moi une part de gâteau means “give me a piece or slice of cake.”
I studied French only for a year, decades ago, but when I was in France a few years ago I ordered some water just by saying “de l’eau, s’il vous plait.” That was the way the waiter had reflected my phrasing when I was trying to make the request.
What Harp and gailcalled said. Just seconding their answers since they put it so well already. :)
Just as an FYI, if a male noun starts with a vowel, then it’s “de l’<noun>”, not “du <noun>”.
For example, “the teeth of the animal” -> “les dents de l’animal”
Whereas “the teeth of the boy” -> “les dents du garçon”
The term is “partitive genitive”—it’s when you’re talking about some of something.
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