Preterite of Trazer | Portuguese (Portugal) Grammar

The verb trazer (to bring) is irregular in the preterite, with its stem changing entirely to troux-. This places it in the "strong" preterite family alongside fazer and dizer, but its stem is unique -- there is no way to predict troux- from the infinitive. Like dizer, the eu and ele/você forms are identical: both are simply trouxe.

Conjugation

Person	Form	English
eu	trouxe	I brought
tu	trouxeste	you brought
ele / ela / você	trouxe	he/she brought; you brought
nós	trouxemos	we brought
(vós)	(trouxestes)	(you all brought)
eles / elas / vocês	trouxeram	they brought; you all brought

The stem troux- carries the stress in the eu and ele forms, making this a strong preterite. The endings follow the standard strong preterite set: -e, -este, -e, -emos, (-estes), -eram -- the same pattern as disse, disseste, disse... for dizer.

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The "x" in trouxe is pronounced /s/ in European Portuguese -- trouxe sounds roughly like "trôsse". Do not pronounce it as /ʃ/ (sh) or /ks/. The "ou" is typically a closed /o/, so the whole word is approximately /ˈtɾose/.

Bringing something (completed action)

The core use of trazer in the preterite -- saying what someone brought.

Trouxe-te um presente.

I brought you a present.

O que trouxeste?

What did you bring?

Trouxemos vinho e sobremesa.

We brought wine and dessert.

Trouxe o guarda-chuva, por sorte.

I brought the umbrella, luckily.

Abstract and figurative bringing

Beyond physical objects, trazer frequently describes what events, decisions, or circumstances brought about.

A crise trouxe muitos problemas.

The crisis brought many problems.

As eleições trouxeram mudanças importantes.

The elections brought important changes.

O novo projeto trouxe mais trabalho para todos.

The new project brought more work for everyone.

This figurative use is extremely common in news, conversation, and formal writing alike.

Trazer vs levar -- direction matters

This is one of the most important distinctions in Portuguese. Both verbs translate to English "bring" or "take," but they encode the direction of movement relative to the speaker.

Trazer = to bring (toward the speaker or the reference point)
Levar = to take (away from the speaker or the reference point)

Trouxe o bolo para a festa.

I brought the cake to the party. (I'm at the party.)

Levei o bolo para a festa.

I took the cake to the party. (I'm not at the party now.)

Situation	Verb	Example
You are at the party, describing what you brought	trazer	Trouxe o bolo. (I brought the cake.)
You are home, describing what you took to the party	levar	Levei o bolo. (I took the cake.)
Someone came to your house with flowers	trazer	Ela trouxe flores. (She brought flowers.)
You sent flowers to someone's house	levar	Levei-lhe flores. (I took her flowers.)

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Think of trazer as movement toward "here" and levar as movement toward "there." If you would say "bring" in English because the destination is where you are, use trazer. If you would say "take" because the destination is somewhere else, use levar.

The -zer family in the preterite

The three common verbs ending in -zer -- fazer, dizer, and trazer -- are all irregular in the preterite, and each has a completely different stem. There is no shared pattern to extract from one to the others.

Verb	Preterite stem	eu	ele/você	eles/vocês
fazer	fiz- / fez-	fiz	fez	fizeram
dizer	diss-	disse	disse	disseram
trazer	troux-	trouxe	trouxe	trouxeram

Notice that fazer distinguishes eu from ele (fiz vs fez), while both dizer and trazer have identical eu and ele forms (disse/disse, trouxe/trouxe). Each of these three stems -- fiz-, diss-, troux- -- must simply be memorized. For details on the other two, see Preterite of Fazer and Preterite of Dizer.

Pronunciation of trouxe

In European Portuguese, the pronunciation of trouxe catches many learners off guard. The spelling suggests sounds that do not match what you actually hear.

The ou is realized as a closed /o/ (not a diphthong -- do not say "oh-oo")
The x is pronounced /s/ (not /ʃ/ as in peixe, and not /ks/ as in English "box")
The result is approximately "trôsse" -- rhyming with fosse

This /s/ pronunciation of x after ou is consistent: coxa (thigh) also has /s/ in EP. It is one of several values that x can take in Portuguese, which is why spelling alone is an unreliable guide to pronunciation.

Common mistakes

1. Applying regular -er endings. Forms like ~~trazeu~~ or ~~trazeram~~ (built on the infinitive stem traz-) do not exist in the preterite. The stem changes entirely to troux-, and the endings are the strong preterite set, not the regular -er set.

2. Pronouncing the x incorrectly. Saying trouxe with a /ʃ/ sound (like "sh") or /ks/ is a common error. In EP, the x here is always /s/.

3. Confusing trazer and levar. English uses "bring" and "take" with less directional precision than Portuguese demands. Always consider where the speaker is relative to the destination before choosing between trouxe and levou.

For the full preterite system, see Preterite Overview. For a verb with a similar identical eu/ele pattern, see Preterite of Dizer. For the present-tense forms of the -zer family, see Present Indicative of Fazer and Dizer.