kill_man

[unkempt thicket]

Please be patient

Our volunteers look into many questions every day; sometimes it takes them a little while to answer.

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[past moon]

you can't normally invert "ce sont"

it exists but it's rare and generally avoided

[oak olive]

i've seen that said in other places but nothing like grammar books so good to have confirmation

so "sont-ils" is fine for identity questions? or would it be more normal to just "ce sont...?" without any inversion

[past moon]

also, I believe you would generally prefer il/ils etc. in questions, especially when the topic is a known, tangible thing, and especially in inversion

https://vitrinelinguistique.oqlf.gouv.qc.ca/24132/la-syntaxe/le-sujet-dans-la-phrase/inversions-admises-et-deconseillees-du-sujet-ce-et-du-verbe-etre

this goes into when you should/can invert "ce"

https://i.hep.gg/GQ2TArqz_

this one for example

the man is unknown, so it's introducing him, so "ce" makes more sense here

[oak olive]

ahhh ok that makes sense

[past moon]

I don't have any solid rules for this though

I just go off of feeling, and inversion is quite rare in general speech

in this case the inversion with "sont" being weird probably influenced it to be "ils" regardless

[oak olive]

cool, merci!