Log inSign up

Lei è la donna.

Lei è la donna.
She is the woman.
From Lesson 1:Definite articles and gender (il, la, l')·Italian

Breakdown of Lei è la donna.

essere
to be
lei
she
la donna
the woman

Questions & Answers about Lei è la donna.

Why does è have an accent mark?
The accent mark is very important! It changes the meaning of the word. è (with the accent) means "is", while e (without the accent) means "and".
Can I just say È la donna without using Lei?
Yes! Italian allows you to drop the subject pronoun because the verb already shows who is doing the action. You can simply say È la donna. We usually only include Lei when we want to emphasize that she specifically is the woman, or to avoid confusion if it is not clear from the context.
Why is the word for "the" la here instead of il?
In Italian, nouns have a gender (masculine or feminine), and the word for "the" must match that gender. donna is a feminine noun, which you can often tell because it ends in -a. Therefore, it uses the feminine article la. If we were talking about a masculine noun ending in -o, we would use il.

Learn Lei è la donna and more in Italian

All course content and exercises are completely free — no paywalls, no trial periods, no signup needed.

  • ✓ Practice with interactive exercises
  • ✓ Track your progress with spaced repetition
  • ✓Learn at your own pace — completely free
Start learning Italian →