¿Cuánta gente había? How many people were there?
No sé cuántos niños tienen. I don’t know how many children
they have.
¿Cuántos tienen su propia casa? How many of them have their
own house?
The masculine singular form of cuántocan also be a neuter pronoun or
adverb meaning ‘how much’:
¿Cuánto cuesta una habitación? How much does a room cost?
Por qué, para qué‘why’
These are both translatable into English as ‘why’, but they are not iden-
tical in meaning.
Por quémeans ‘for what reason/motive’, whereas para quémeans ‘to what
end/for what purpose’. Por quéis by far the commoner.
¿Por qué no me has llamado? Why didn’t you call me?
¿Por qué han cerrado el puente?Why has the bridge been closed?
¿Para qué necesitas otro perro? What do you need another
dog for?
Translating English ‘how’ + adjective or adverb in questions
There is no neat way of doing this in Spanish, and so a variety of strate-
gies must be employed. The commonest ones are given below.
Adjectives:
¿Cuánto mides? How tall are you?
¿Cómo es tu casa de grande? How big is your house?
¿Cuántos años tienes? How old are you?
Adverbs:
¿Con qué frecuencia se reúnen? How frequently do they meet?
¿A qué velocidad ibas? How fast were you going?
¿De qué gravedad fueron sus How badly was he injured?
lesiones?
¿Cuánto tiempo tardaste en How long did it take you to
hacerlo? do it?
27.2.7
27.2.6
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1011
1
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3 4 5 6 7 8 9
20111
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
30111
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
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Spanish
interrogative
words
281
