Learn Spanish (Latin America): La niña no tiene el gato.

La niña no tiene el gato.

The girl does not have the cat.

Breakdown of La niña no tiene el gato.

Questions & Answers about La niña no tiene el gato.

Why is it no tiene instead of having a word for "does"?

In English, we use helper words like "does not" or "don't" to make a negative sentence. Spanish is much simpler! You don't need a word for "does." You just put no directly in front of the verb. So, no tiene simply means "does not have."

Where exactly does the no go in this sentence?

In basic Spanish sentences, the word no always goes directly before the verb. Here, the subject is La niña (The girl), the verb is tiene (has), and the object is el gato (the cat). To make it negative, you just put no right before the verb: La niña no tiene el gato.

Why is the verb tiene in this sentence?

Tiene is the "he/she/it" form of the verb tener, which means "to have." Since the subject of the sentence is La niña (which corresponds to "she"), we use tiene.

Why do we use la for the girl but el for the cat?

In Spanish, all nouns have a gender, and the word for "the" has to match it. Niña (girl) is a feminine noun, so it takes the feminine article la. Gato (cat) is a masculine noun, so it takes the masculine article el.