Word
A vítima perdeu o celular.
Meaning
The victim lost the cell phone.
Part of speech
sentence
Pronunciation
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Questions & Answers about A vítima perdeu o celular.
Why is it a vítima and not o vítima?
Because vítima is a feminine noun in Portuguese, so it takes the feminine article a.
A very important point: grammatical gender is not always the same as the person’s real-life sex. So a vítima can refer to:
- a female victim
- a male victim
Even if the victim is a man, Portuguese still says a vítima because the noun itself is grammatically feminine.
Examples:
- A vítima era um homem. = The victim was a man.
- A vítima era uma mulher. = The victim was a woman.
What does perdeu mean exactly?
Perdeu is the preterite (simple past) form of the verb perder, which means to lose.
So:
- perder = to lose
- perdeu = lost
In this sentence, A vítima perdeu o celular, perdeu means lost in the completed past sense: the loss happened.
It can mean:
- accidentally losing something
- no longer having it
- sometimes, depending on context, having it taken away or stolen
But by itself, the most natural basic reading is simply lost.
Why is it o celular?