Learn Hardcore Portuguese (Portugal): Ele disse‑me também que “comer” é um verbo irregular importante. - He also told me that “comer” is an important irregular verb.

In European Portuguese, unstressed object pronouns like me, te, se, o, a, lhe are often attached to the verb with a hyphen. This is called enclisis.

So instead of:

✗ disse me

you write:

✔ disse-me

This happens when nothing before the verb forces the pronoun to come before it. In this sentence, there is no word like não (not), que (that), se (if), etc. directly before disse, so the default in European Portuguese is to attach me after the verb: disse-me.

In Brazilian Portuguese, you almost never see this in everyday speech; people would usually say ele me disse (pronoun before the verb, no hyphen).

Could we also say Ele também me disse que… instead of Ele disse-me também que…? Are both correct?

Yes, both are grammatically correct in European Portuguese:

Ele disse-me também que…
Ele também me disse que…

The differences are:

Ele disse-me também que…
Slightly more formal / “bookish”; keeps the pronoun attached to the verb (disse-me). Também is a bit more detached and can feel like “he told me this also (in addition to something else).”
Ele também me disse que…
Very natural in everyday speech. The adverb também comes earlier, and the pronoun me is before disse (me disse), which sounds more like Brazilian Portuguese but is also widely heard in European Portuguese.

If you want a very neutral, spoken-European-Portuguese version, Ele também me disse que… is a good choice.

Why do we need que in disse‑me também que comer é…? In English we often drop that.

In this sentence, que works like English that introducing a subordinate clause:

Ele disse-me também que comer é um verbo irregular importante.
= He also told me *that “comer” is an important irregular verb.*

In English you can say either:

He told me that…
He told me … (and drop that)

In Portuguese, in this kind of sentence you normally must keep que; dropping it would sound wrong or at least very odd here:

✔ Ele disse-me que comer é…
✗ Ele disse-me comer é… (ungrammatical)

So think of que here as a required “that”.

Why is comer in the infinitive here and not come or some other form?

When you talk about a verb as a word, you normally use its infinitive, just like in English you say:

The verb *to eat is important.*

In Portuguese, the dictionary form of the verb is the infinitive ending in -ar, -er, -ir, so:

comer = to eat

So we say:

“comer” é um verbo irregular importante.
= “to eat” is an important irregular verb.

Using come (he eats / he ate depending on language) would change the meaning: it would no longer be referring to the verb as a grammatical item, but to an action.

Why is comer written in quotation marks in the sentence? When should I use quotation marks for verbs like this?

The quotation marks show that we are talking about the word itself, not using it in its usual meaning.

Compare:

O João come muito. – João eats a lot. (using the verb)
“comer” é um verbo. – “comer” is a verb. (mentioning the word)

In grammar explanations, you will often see:

“comer” é um verbo do segundo grupo.
“ir” é um verbo irregular.

In your own writing, instead of quotation marks, you can also use italics or bold:

comer é um verbo irregular importante.

The function is the same: to highlight the word as a word.

Is comer really an irregular verb?

In standard grammar, comer is actually considered a regular verb of the -er conjugation.

Its forms follow the regular pattern:

eu como, tu comes, ele come, nós comemos, eles comem
eu comi, tu comeste, ele comeu, nós comemos, eles comeram
past participle: comido

Nothing unusual happens to the stem, so it is regular.

So if a teacher or book calls comer “irregular”, they may be simplifying or putting it in a list of “important verbs to learn” rather than strictly “irregular verbs”. Strictly speaking, verbs like ser, estar, ir, ter, fazer are clear irregular verbs; comer is not.

Why do we use é and not está in “comer” é um verbo irregular importante?

Portuguese has two verbs for to be: ser and estar.

ser is used for permanent, defining characteristics or classifications.
estar is used for temporary states or conditions.

In “comer” é um verbo irregular importante, we are defining what comer is (its type/class):

It is a verb.
It is (supposedly) irregular.
It is important.

These are seen as permanent properties of the word comer, so we use ser → é, not estar → está.

Saying “comer” está um verbo… would be ungrammatical.

Can we leave out Ele and just say Disse‑me também que…?

Yes, you can omit the subject pronoun in Portuguese:

Disse-me também que comer é um verbo irregular importante.

Portuguese is a “pro-drop” language: the verb ending (disse) already tells you the subject is ele/ela/você from context.

However:

Keeping Ele (Ele disse-me…) is clearer when you need to emphasize who said it or when there are multiple possible subjects in the context.
Dropping Ele (Disse-me…) sounds a bit more formal or narrative, like in written stories or reports.

Both are correct; choose based on how clear the subject is from the surrounding context.

Why is the order um verbo irregular importante and not um importante verbo irregular?

In Portuguese, adjectives normally come after the noun:

um verbo irregular – an irregular verb
um carro novo – a new car

With two adjectives, the usual “neutral” order is still noun + adjective + adjective:

um verbo irregular importante
literally: a verb irregular important

You can say um importante verbo irregular, but:

Putting importante before the noun adds emphasis or a more literary tone (like “a very important irregular verb”).
The default, most neutral order in everyday speech is um verbo irregular importante.

So the sentence uses the common, neutral order.

How would this sentence typically look in Brazilian Portuguese? Is there any difference?

In Brazilian Portuguese, people usually avoid attaching pronouns with a hyphen in everyday speech, and prefer the pronoun before the verb. A natural Brazilian version would be:

Ele também me disse que “comer” é um verbo importante.

Brazil-specific points:

disse-me sounds formal/old-fashioned in Brazil; me disse is normal.
Brazilians are even more likely to call comer a regular verb, so they might say um verbo importante or um verbo regular importante instead of um verbo irregular importante.
Pronunciation is different (especially vowels and r, t, d), but the structure and words are almost the same.