Look at these examples:
Léo a reçu un vélo tout neuf pour son anniversaire.
Leo received a brand new bike for his birthday.
J'ai acheté un nouveau vélo.
I bought a new bike.
C'est une voiture d'occasion?
- Non, elle est neuve.
Is it a second-hand car?
- No, it's new.
Emilie a trouvé sa nouvelle table au marché aux puces.
Emilie found her new table at the flea market.
Notice that there is a nuance in French between neuf/neuve and nouveau/nouvelle.
While both mean 'new', neuf implies that it's never been used before, brand new (Note that it cannot apply to living things, e.g. pets), whereas nouveau just means 'new' in a more general sense.
In some context, obviously, both are correct.
However, the main difference of usage is the position in the sentence:
- neuf is placed AFTER the noun
- nouveau is placed BEFORE the noun
See also Beau, nouveau, vieux, fou, mou have two masculine forms and one feminine form
Emilie a trouvé sa nouvelle table au marché aux puces.
Emilie found her new table at the flea market.
C'est une voiture d'occasion?
- Non, elle est neuve.
Is it a second-hand car?
- No, it's new.
J'ai acheté un nouveau vélo.
I bought a new bike.
Léo a reçu un vélo tout neuf pour son anniversaire.
Leo received a brand new bike for his birthday.
The rule with c'est vs il/elle is that you are speaking of a specific item. In this lesson one of the examples doesn't appear to follow that rule:
The lesson translates "Is it a second-hand car?- No, it's new." to "C'est une voiture d'occasion? - Non, elle est neuve."
Why doesn't the question use Elle instead of C'est? They are talking about a specific car--i.e. the one purchased by the speaker.
Hi Alvin,
I can see your confusion but in the question -
C'est une voiture d'occasion?
it has to be c'est because in French you cannot say-
il/elle est + une
I know it is tricky for English speakers but that's just how it is ...
The rule with c'est vs il/elle is that you are speaking of a specific item. In this lesson one of the examples doesn't appear to follow that rule:
The lesson translates "Is it a second-hand car?- No, it's new." to "C'est une voiture d'occasion? - Non, elle est neuve."
Why doesn't the question use Elle instead of C'est? They are talking about a specific car--i.e. the one purchased by the speaker.
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Hi Antonia,
I suppose it is to just highlight the distinction between 'nouveau' and 'neuf'.
If you say:
J'ai un nouveau vélo.
It means you have a bike which is new to you but not necessarily brand new, i.e., it could be second-hand.
Hope this helps!
"J'ai acheté un nouveau vélo." This sentence doesn't align well with your other examples; that is to say, is it brand-new, or is it simply new to me? The implication is that I bought a 'new' second-hand bike. Is that what you are trying to convey?
I think the confusion stems from the fact that, in English, if I say "I bought a new bike", it would sound funny if this meant I bought a used bike which was merely new to me. It's not impossible that the sentence would have this meaning, but without other context, I would say that someone was being misleading in using "new" in this way. Hence, "J’ai acheté un vélo neuf" would be a more natural translation of the standard English meaning.
(Edit: it seems that the question might be about the placement of the adjective as well, whether before the noun for nouveau or after for neuf. But it's still odd to say in English "I bought a new bike" in general.)
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It is "la voiture", therefore "elle" and "neuve" both are in the feminine form since they refer to it.
You don't say "c'est.." because you refer to a specific vehicle, in which case you use "elle" instead of the impersonal "ce".
Here is the lesson on this: https://french.kwiziq.com/revision/grammar/when-to-use-cest-or-il-est-elle-est-to-say-it-is
-- Chris (not a native speaker).
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