Breakdown of Χτες είχαμε μικρό καβγά με τον αδερφό μου για τις δουλειές του σπιτιού.
το σπίτι
the home
έχω
to have
μου
my
με
with
Questions & Answers about Χτες είχαμε μικρό καβγά με τον αδερφό μου για τις δουλειές του σπιτιού.
Why is it Χτες here and sometimes I see Χθες with a θ? Is there any difference?
Both Χτες and Χθες mean “yesterday” and are pronounced the same way: /xtes/.
- Χτες: more common in everyday, informal writing.
- Χθες: more traditional / slightly more formal spelling.
In speech there is no difference at all; you can treat them as the same word.
Can I change the position of Χτες in the sentence? For example, can I say Είχαμε μικρό καβγά με τον αδερφό μου χτες?
Yes, you can move Χτες (yesterday) without changing the meaning. All of these are natural:
- Χτες είχαμε μικρό καβγά με τον αδερφό μου…
- Είχαμε μικρό καβγά με τον αδερφό μου χτες…
- Είχαμε χτες μικρό καβγά με τον αδερφό μου…
Greek word order is quite flexible. Time expressions like χτες often come at the beginning, but putting them later is also fine.
What tense is είχαμε here? Is it “we were having” or “we had”?
Είχαμε is the past tense of έχω (to have). In English it corresponds to “we had” here.
Modern Greek uses the same past form είχαμε for both a simple past (“we had once”) and a continuous past (“we were having / used to have”). The context decides:
- In this sentence, Χτες είχαμε μικρό καβγά…, it clearly refers to one event yesterday, so you understand it as “we had a small argument yesterday.”