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Tag Archives: Italian verbs

Idiomatic Expressions With The Italian Verb Avere Posted by on Mar 11, 2016

Avere means ‘to have’ … simple, right? Well, unfortunately not! You’ll frequently find the Italian verb for ‘to have’ (avere) used where we would use ‘to be’ (essere) in English, e.g. ‘I am thirsty’ translates as ‘ho sete’ (literally: I have thirst), and ‘they are right’ translates as ‘hanno ragione’ (literally: they have reason) Here’s a list of the…

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Prendere: To Take? Posted by on Oct 30, 2014

We all know that prendere means to take, as in prendiamo l’autobus o andiamo a piedi? (shall we take the bus or walk?), or prendi questa borsa (take this bag). However prendere is one of those verbs that can be used in many different situations. Let’s look at some of its most common uses: 1…

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How to use the Past Conditional in Italian Posted by on Oct 22, 2014

Last week we took a look at the present conditional, which, if you missed it, you can find HERE. Today we are going to look at il condizionale passato (the past conditional). Here are a couple of examples of how we conjugate it, firstly with the auxiliary verb essere (to be): Coniugazione del verbo essere…

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How to use the Present Conditional in Italian Posted by on Oct 16, 2014

While I was replying a reader’s question last week about the differences between the congiuntivo presente and the condizionale, I realised that although I’ve covered the use of the congiuntivo presente I’d never written an article specifically on the use of the condizionale (conditional). So I’m going to make amends, beginning today with il condizionale…

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Are You Paying Attention? Posted by on Sep 17, 2014

Are you paying attention, and if so, how much are you paying? Here in Italy, we don’t pay attention, we lend attention (prestiamo attenzione). This leads me onto the interesting topic of lending and borrowing. Interesting, because in Italian we use one verb for both actions: prestare. Let’s have a look at how it works…

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Using Essere and Stare in the Past Tense Posted by on Aug 29, 2014

Recently I received a comment from a reader asking about the correct use of the imperfect and present perfect of essere and stare. Here is my reply: Firstly, if you want to revise the difference between essere and stare, you can read THIS BLOG. Now let’s have a look at their use in the imperfetto…

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Verbs Followed by the Preposition ‘a’ Posted by on Dec 12, 2009

In my previous article Che or Il Quale I promised you a list of common verbs that are normally followed by the preposition a (to). This preposition is used with the indirect object of verbs such as dare (to give), e.g. Laura ha dato un libro a Giorgio (Laura gave a book to Giorgio). It…

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