"N'aura nul lieu" translated to English directly means "shall not have no place". But it seems to mean "shall have no place". So I wonder how negation works in French.
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N'aura nul lieu is quite outdated. Modern French rather uses either n'aura aucun lieu or n'aura nulle part.
In any case, this is not a double negation example but just a split negative where both ne and nul(le)/aucun are used to negate "aura un lieu/aura quelque part" (i.e. will have "somewhere" vs will have "nowhere").
A real double negation would have been n'aura pas nul lieu: will have "no nowhere".
See: Why does French use a "split negative"? Does `ne` and `pas` have a different meaning? Does "ne" not negate words that are already negative?
jlliagre
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No, this is not double negation. But it is a difference between English and French since the direct translation in English is like "shall not have no place", right? – E Zhang Apr 25 '21 at 15:59
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A direct translation of what? – jlliagre Apr 25 '21 at 16:45
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A direct translation of "n'aura aucun lieu" is "shall not have no place". – E Zhang Apr 25 '21 at 16:51
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Translates to "will have no place". – jlliagre Apr 25 '21 at 16:52
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Yes, I know that. I mean "n'aura" is translated directly to "shall not have". – E Zhang Apr 25 '21 at 16:55
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As far as spoken/casual French is concerned, aura and n'aura can be interchangeable. You need a complete phrase to assert the meaning. – jlliagre Apr 25 '21 at 17:20
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Does "aucun" also mean "any" in English? So a direct translation of "n'aura aucun lieu" is "shall not have any place", which is consistent with English (completely). – E Zhang Apr 25 '21 at 17:31
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Aucun can mean "none", "any", or even "some". Context is everything. – jlliagre Apr 25 '21 at 17:37