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Il n'y a rien dans la soupe.

Il n'y a rien dans la soupe.
There is nothing in the soup.
From Lesson 62:Never (ne... jamais)·French

Questions & Answers about Il n'y a rien dans la soupe.

I thought negative sentences needed pas. Where did it go?
Just like the ne ... jamais (never) structure you might be studying, ne ... rien (nothing) replaces the pas. You use rien instead of pas to mean 'nothing', so you never say ne ... pas rien.
Why is the ne attached to the y as n' instead of going before the verb a?
In the phrase il y a (there is / there are), the pronoun y and the verb a stick together as a single block. The negative ne goes right before this block. Since y acts like a vowel here, ne drops its e to become n'. The second part of the negative (rien) goes after the verb a.
Is this the same rien used when saying 'you're welcome'?
Yes! When someone says thank you, you often reply de rien, which literally translates to 'of nothing'. In this sentence, rien simply means 'nothing' as in 'There is nothing'.

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