Parli Italiano?
Chapter 2: Ripasso Trapassato Prossimo
The trapassato prossimo is used to indicate a past action that happened before another past action (at the passato prossimo or imperfetto).
Avevo appena mangiato un panino, quando sei arrivata.
[I had just eaten a sandwich, when you arrived.]
Non volevamo fare l’esercizio che il professore ci aveva assegnato.
[We did not want to do the exercise that the professor had assigned to us.]
The trapassato prossimo is a compound tense made up of two words:
- the imperfect tense of avere or essere
- the past participle of the verb, as in the examples:
Era andata a casa.
How do you form the past participles of verbs?
- For verbs in –are: –are turns into –ato, as in parlare> parlato.
- For verbs in –ere: –ere turns into –uto, as in credere> creduto.
- For verbs in –ire: –ire turns into –ito, as in sentire> sentito.
How do you know whether to use avere or essere?
- You use avere with all verbs, except with those verbs that require essere. Avere is basically always used when a direct object follows an action, as in Avevo ordinato un caffè [I had ordered a coffee]. In this case, caffè is the direct object. A direct object can also be a person, as in Avevo conosciuto Francesca [I met Francesca]. The direct object may not be explicit, as in Avevo ordinato.
- You use essere with verbs that express moving from a place to another (i.e. andare, venire, partire, arrivare, uscire, etc.), verbs that express states of being (i.e. essere, stare, rimanere/restare), verbs that express changes of status like nascere [to be born], crescere [to grow], diventare [to become], morire [to die] and reflexive verbs.
- Note that stare and essere share the same past participle: ero stato/a means I had been and I had stayed.
- Essere is basically always used when there is no direct object, but rather the action of moving to or from a place.
Study the following conjugations:
[table id=6 /]
[notice that PARLATO never changes]
[table id=7 /]
[notice that PARTITO works like an adjective: PARTITO/PARTITA/PARTITI/PARTITE]
For trapassato prossimo verbs with auxiliary essere, the gender and number of the past participle depends on who the subject is: a woman will say ero andata, but two men will say eravamo andati.
In the trapassato prossimo, all reflexive verbs take essere as the auxiliary. As for all verbs that take essere in the trapassato prossimo, a singular female subject will say mi ero persa, a masculine plural subject will say ci eravamo persi, etc.
[table id=8 /]
The trapassato prossimo is used to express an action that happened before another past action, but when the past action is implicit, meaning it is not explicitly expressed in the sentence, the trapassato prossimo can be used by itself.
→ Paola non era mai stata a Firenze prima d’ora.
NOTA BENE
mai (never), prima (before), ancora (yet), sempre (always), più (anymore), etc.