Spanish: An Essential Grammar

Word order in Spanish is very flexible in comparison to English. In partic- ular, the positioning of the subject in relation to ...

The first sentence, with a las tres y mediaat the end, is the obvious vehicle for countering the claim that the children come ou ...

The subject often follows the verb if a direct object pronoun is present The use of a direct object pronoun normally implies tha ...

Specific constructions The following guidelines apply to specific constructions. Subjects with no article must follow the verb W ...

¿Has visto la casa que se han comprado Pepi y Juan? Have you seen the house that Pepi and Juan have bought? He perdido el libro ...

Subject-verb inversion in questions In several types of question the subject is placed after the verb. General rules for subject ...

¿Está Mercedes cantando? Is Mercedes singing? (focus on verb) ¿Está cantando Mercedes? Is Mercedes singing? (focus on subject) ¿ ...

The purpose of this chapter is to offer some insight into the structure of words in Spanish and the meaning of some of their com ...

When the addition of a suffix removes the stress in a word away from a previously stressed ieor ue, these syllables frequently ( ...

The suffixes -eraand -eroindicate the place where something is put. The related suffix -derooften indicates where something is d ...

hundir to sink hundimiento sinking salvar to save salvamento rescue/salvaging The suffixes -ador, -edorand -idor(corresponding t ...

International suffixes A number of Spanish suffixes have equivalents in other European languages. The most common of these are - ...

bolso bag bolsillo pocket pollo chicken polluelo chick There are exceptions, e.g. mano ‘hand’ gives both manita and manecita. Th ...

¡habla bajito! speak quite low! ahora mismito right now cerquita quite close ayercito just yesterday tempranito nice and early u ...

botella bottle botellín small bottle of beer tesis thesis tesina dissertation The various forms of -ico, originally mainly Arago ...

cintura waist cinturón belt oferta offer ofertón bargain dulce sweet dulzón sickly sweet fácil easy facilón dead easy A characte ...

blanco white blancucho dirty white cama bed camastro rickety old bed Combinations of suffixes Sometimes suffixes can be used in ...

nata cream desnatar skim (e.g. milk) cafeína caffeine descafeinar decaffeinate vía route desviar(se) change course/divert pelo h ...

elección election reelección reelection orientar to direct reorientar to redirect cartucho remanufacturado re-manufactured cartr ...

supercola superglue super ambicioso very/over ambitious contraoferta counter offer a contraluz against the light traspasar to pi ...