Word
Als es Krieg gab, stand die feindliche Armee vor der Festung.
Meaning
When there was war, the enemy army stood before the fortress.
Part of speech
sentence
Pronunciation
Course
Breakdown of Als es Krieg gab, stand die feindliche Armee vor der Festung.
stehen
to stand
vor
in front of
es gibt
there is / there are
der Krieg
the war
Questions & Answers about Als es Krieg gab, stand die feindliche Armee vor der Festung.
Why is Als used here instead of Wenn for the word "When"?
In German, als is strictly used for a single event or a continuous period of time that happened entirely in the past (like a specific war). If the sentence referred to the present or future, or if it meant a recurring past event ("Whenever there was a war"), you would have to use wenn.
How does the phrase es Krieg gab translate to "there was war"?
This is the simple past (Präteritum) form of the extremely common phrase es gibt (there is / there are). Since the past tense of geben is gab, es gab translates to "there was" or "there were". Just like es gibt, it technically puts the following noun into the accusative case, though the form of Krieg doesn't visibly change here without an article.
Why does the second part of the sentence start with the verb stand rather than the subject die feindliche Armee?
This is due to the standard "verb-second" (V2) rule in German main clauses. The entire dependent clause (Als es Krieg gab) occupies the first position in the sentence. To keep the verb in the second position, the conjugated verb of the main clause (stand) must come immediately after the comma, followed by the subject (die feindliche Armee).
Why is it vor der Festung (dative) rather than vor die Festung (accusative)?