In the sentence "Quanta cioccolata avete mangiato?" The answer will be "Ne abbiamo mangiate poca" or "Ne abbiamo mangiata poca"? Does mangiare get an E because of Ne or does it get an A because cioccolata is a singular feminine noun?
Thanks!
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3The correct answer is the second one. Cioccolata is a singular noun. In this case “ne” works as a “pronome partitivo” and is used to refer to a quantity or part of it both in the singular and in the plural. oneworlditaliano.com/grammatica-italiana/…– user519Jul 31, 2019 at 3:42
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1Welcome to Italian.SE! This is a related question: italian.stackexchange.com/questions/54/… (maybe it's a duplicate, at least one of the answers address "ne" particle).– Charo ♦Jul 31, 2019 at 7:53
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1@egreg: But, it would be "ne abbiamo mangiato" referring to "cioccolata"?– Charo ♦Jul 31, 2019 at 8:53
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2Being the subject clearly “cioccolata” I’d recommend the use of the feminine desinence despite recent trends.– user519Jul 31, 2019 at 9:05
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1@egreg: But this article of Treccani Encyclopedia (2011) says: "L’accordo del participio con l’oggetto è invece obbligatorio con ne usato come partitivo in funzione di oggetto".– Charo ♦Jul 31, 2019 at 9:21
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2 Answers
According to Treccani Encyclopedia, agreement in gender and number of past participle with direct object is compulsory when the pronominal particle "ne" is used as a partitive with the function of direct object
L’accordo del participio con l’oggetto è invece obbligatorio con ne usato come partitivo in funzione di oggetto
and gives these examples:
- di film, ne ho visti parecchi
- ho comprato delle mele e ne ho mangiate tre (Cordin 2001: 650).
So, according to this rule, you should say
Ne abbiamo mangiata poca
because past participle "mangiata" must agree in gender and number with the direct object (which has been substituted by "ne") "cioccolata".
The correct answer is definitely "ne abbiamo mangiata poca" as already said in comments. Here "mangiata" gets a final A because it refers to "cioccolata".
