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De vs el when talking about things made up of something

by RandomLanguageLearnr, July 19, 2022

Messages: 4

Language: English

RandomLanguageLearnr (User's profile) July 19, 2022, 8:32:59 PM

This is more of a small question, but when describing something like a piece of cake or piece of plastic, could you use el instead of de?
ex.
La peco de kuko estas bona. - The piece of cake is good.
La peco el kuko estas bona. - The piece of cake/made out of cake is good

Metsis (User's profile) July 20, 2022, 7:26:23 AM

Of all prepositions the preposition de has most meanings in Esperanto. One can say too many, as PIV lists 13. The preposition el has "only" 6 meanings. The basic difference between them is that de shows movement out from an "open" space, while el does the same for a "closed" space.
 
  • Li venis de la domo : He came from (a position next to) the house, i.e. he was not inside.
  • Ŝi venis el la domo : She came out of the house, i.e. she was inside.
  • Atendu, mi unue forveturu mian aŭton de la parkejo : Wait, I shall first drive my car away from a parking lot (like one by a road).
  • Atendu, mi unue forveturu mian aŭton el la parkejo : Wait, I shall first drive my car out of a parking house (i.e. the car is inside of a parking building).
But both prepositions have several less concrete uses, which you just have to memorise (see PIV). One of these is using de to couple two nouns when one quantifies the other, i.e. denotes an amount of it. Thus
 
  • La peco de kuko estas bona : you quantify the cake using pieces
  • En la daŭro de kelkaj minutoj mi aŭdis du pafojn : you quantify the length of time using minutes

Metsis (User's profile) July 20, 2022, 7:46:07 AM

Additional info

When the quantified thing is an uncountable one, you use the preposition da instead of de. Therefore
 
  • La peco de kuko estas bona.
  • Mi vidis pecon da ĉielo.
See the basic rules of using da in the grammar section here in Lernu.

RandomLanguageLearnr (User's profile) July 21, 2022, 1:48:47 AM

Hmm... I can see the way de and el might be used differently now and how the grammar of a phrase like, "a piece of cake" works. I think I'm beginning to get the difference of de and da, though I think I'll have to look into a bit. Thank you!

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