Breakdown of Na semana anterior, eu trabalhei muito e estava cansado.
Questions & Answers about Na semana anterior, eu trabalhei muito e estava cansado.
In Portuguese, the preposition em (in/on/at) usually contracts with the definite article (a, o, as, os).
- em + a = na
- em + o = no
- em + as = nas
- em + os = nos
Because semana is feminine singular and we’re talking about a specific week (the previous week), you need the article a:
- em a semana anterior → contracts to na semana anterior
You don’t normally say just em semana anterior here, because that would sound like “in a previous week” in a more generic way. The sentence is referring to a specific time frame: the previous week (relative to some point), so the article is natural and the contraction na is required in normal speech/writing.
Both can often be translated as “last week”, but there are nuances:
semana passada
- Most common in everyday speech.
- Usually means the calendar week immediately before this one.
- Sounds more informal / neutral.
semana anterior
- A bit more formal or bookish.
- Often means “the week before (some reference point in time)”, not necessarily the week before today.
- Very common in narratives, reports, news, etc., where you’re talking about a sequence of past events:
- Na semana anterior, eu tinha começado o novo emprego.
“In the week before (that), I had started the new job.”
- Na semana anterior, eu tinha começado o novo emprego.
In your sentence, Na semana anterior can be either:
- “The week before that” (if there’s a narrative context), or
- More generally, “the previous week” / “last week” (often clearer if context is present).
You can drop eu here:
- Na semana anterior, trabalhei muito e estava cansado.
In Portuguese, subject pronouns (eu, tu, ele, etc.) are often optional because the verb ending shows who the subject is:
- trabalhei → 1st person singular (I worked)
Including eu is usually for:
- Emphasis: stressing that I (not someone else) did it.
- Clarity: when the subject might be ambiguous in a longer or more complex sentence.
- Rhythm / style preferences in speech.
In this short sentence, both are correct:
- With eu: slightly more explicit/emphatic.
- Without eu: more typical, natural-sounding Portuguese.
Portuguese distinguishes between:
Pretérito perfeito (simple past) – trabalhei
- Used for completed actions in the past.
- “I worked (and that period of work is finished).”
Pretérito imperfeito – trabalhava
- Used for ongoing, repeated, or habitual past actions, or to set background.
- “I used to work / I was working / I would work (regularly).”
In Na semana anterior, eu trabalhei muito..., the speaker is talking about one specific, completed week and summarising it as a finished block of time. That’s why trabalhei is correct.
If you said:
- Naquela altura, eu trabalhava muito e estava sempre cansado.
this would suggest a longer period or a habit in the past: “At that time, I used to work a lot and was always tired.”
Both are past forms of estar, but:
estava – pretérito imperfeito
- Describes ongoing states, background conditions, or repeated feelings in the past.
- Often translated as “was” (emphasising duration or background).
- Here: “I was (feeling) tired” as a background state during that time.
estive – pretérito perfeito
- Describes a completed, bounded state in the past.
- Often suggests a specific period with a clearer beginning and end:
- Estive cansado durante dois dias. – “I was tired for two days (then it ended).”
In your sentence, Na semana anterior, eu trabalhei muito e estava cansado, the tiredness is presented as a background state that coexisted with that week’s work, so estava is the natural choice.
If you used estive cansado here, it would sound like you are strongly marking the tiredness as a finished episode, which is less natural in this simple summary.
In Portuguese, adverbs like muito often come after the verb they modify:
- trabalhar muito – “to work a lot”
- comer muito – “to eat a lot”
- chover muito – “to rain a lot”
So eu trabalhei muito is the standard word order.
Other possibilities:
Muito trabalhei eu na semana anterior.
- This is possible but quite marked; it sounds literary, dramatic, or old‑fashioned, not neutral.
Eu muito trabalhei
- Also sounds unusual and heavily emphatic in modern European Portuguese.
For everyday speech and writing, verb + muito is what you want:
trabalhei muito = “I worked a lot / I worked very hard.”
Adjectives in Portuguese agree in gender and number with the noun they describe.
Here, cansado is describing the subject eu (“I”).
If the speaker is male, you say:
- Eu estava cansado.
If the speaker is female, you say:
- Eu estava cansada.
If the subject is plural:
- Nós estávamos cansados. (all male or mixed group)
- Nós estávamos cansadas. (all female)
So the correct form depends on who is speaking:
- A man: Na semana anterior, eu trabalhei muito e estava cansado.
- A woman: Na semana anterior, eu trabalhei muito e estava cansada.
You can write it with or without the comma:
- Na semana anterior, eu trabalhei muito e estava cansado.
- Na semana anterior eu trabalhei muito e estava cansado.
Both are acceptable.
General idea:
- A short time expression at the beginning (like Na semana anterior, Ontem, De manhã) often appears without a comma in informal writing.
- A comma is more likely if:
- the phrase is longer, or
- the writer wants a small pause for clarity or rhythm.
So:
- Spoken Portuguese: natural with or without a pause.
- Written Portuguese: both versions are correct; it’s mostly a matter of style here.
Yes, you could. That would use the pretérito mais-que-perfeito composto (past perfect):
- eu tinha trabalhado – “I had worked”
Difference:
eu trabalhei muito
- Simple past: places the action in the past, completed.
- Neutral, straightforward: “I worked a lot.”
eu tinha trabalhado muito
- Past perfect: places the action before another past reference point.
- Implies there is another later past event that you’re contrasting with or leading up to.
Example context:
- Na semana anterior, eu tinha trabalhado muito e, por isso, naquela sexta‑feira, não fui à festa.
- “In the previous week, I had worked a lot and, because of that, I didn’t go to the party that Friday.”
In your isolated sentence, trabalhei is more natural and simpler unless you’re clearly contrasting it with another past event.
Yes, this is perfectly correct:
- Eu trabalhei muito na semana anterior e estava cansado.
Main differences are about focus and rhythm, not grammar:
Na semana anterior, eu trabalhei muito...
- Focuses first on the time (“As for the previous week...”), then explains what happened.
- Very common in storytelling, narratives, reports.
Eu trabalhei muito na semana anterior...
- Starts with the subject + action (“I worked a lot”), and then adds when.
- Slightly more neutral, conversational order.
Both are fully natural in European Portuguese; choice depends on what you want to highlight first: the time frame or what you did.
Grammatically, the sentence is fine in both varieties:
- Na semana anterior, eu trabalhei muito e estava cansado.
Differences are mainly:
- Pronunciation (accent, vowel quality, rhythm).
- Frequency of alternatives:
- In everyday Brazilian Portuguese, you’d more often hear Na semana passada instead of Na semana anterior in casual conversation.
- In both varieties, semana anterior is common in written or more formal language (news, reports, narratives).
So structurally, you can use this sentence in Portugal and Brazil; it is especially natural in somewhat formal or narrative contexts.