Il distributore viene rifornito di benzina due volte al giorno.
The gas pump is refilled twice a day.
……
Breakdown of Il distributore viene rifornito di benzina due volte al giorno.
di
of
la volta
the time
il giorno
the day
venire
to come
due
two
al
on
il distributore
the gas pump
rifornire
to refill
la benzina
the gasoline
Questions & Answers about Il distributore viene rifornito di benzina due volte al giorno.
What does distributore refer to in this sentence?
Here distributore is short for distributore di benzina, meaning gas station or fuel pump. In everyday Italian you’ll often hear just il distributore when somebody means “the petrol station.”
How is the passive voice formed with viene rifornito?
Italian uses venire + past participle to make a passive:
- viene = 3rd-person singular present of venire
- rifornito = past participle of rifornire
So viene rifornito literally means “is refueled.” Note that rifornito agrees in gender/number with the subject (distributore is masculine singular).
Why use viene instead of è (as in è rifornito) for the passive?
Both venire and essere can form the passive in Italian, but they carry slightly different tones:
- venire passive often focuses on the action (“is being done”)
- essere passive can stress the resulting state (“is in the condition of”)
In contexts like scheduled operations or news reports, viene rifornito is more common and dynamic than è rifornito.
Why is there di before benzina instead of another preposition?
The verb rifornire has the pattern rifornire X di Y (“to supply X with Y”). That means you always introduce what is supplied with di:
- rifornire l’ospedale di medicine
- rifornire la macchina di carburante
Why is there no article before benzina? Shouldn’t it be di la benzina?
Here benzina is an uncountable mass noun used in a general sense. After di you drop the article when you mean any of that substance:
- abbiamo bisogno di acqua (not dell’acqua)
- porto un bicchiere di vino (not del vino)
What does due volte al giorno mean, and why al giorno?
Due volte al giorno = two times per day. Breakdown:
- due = two
- volte = instances (plural of volta)
- al = contraction of a + il, used here like “per” in English (“per day”)
A more literary option is due volte al dì, but al giorno is the everyday choice.
How would the sentence change if distributore were plural?
You must make both venire and the participle plural to agree:
I distributori vengono riforniti di benzina due volte al giorno.
Could you use the si-passive here, like Si rifornisce il distributore di benzina?
No. That si form is the reflexive rifornirsi (“to stock oneself up”), not a passive. To say “the station is refueled,” you need a true passive (venire + participle or essere + participle), not a reflexive construction.
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