El pájaro escapó ayer.

In Spanish, articles are used more often than in English. El pájaro usually means the bird, referring to a specific bird that speaker and listener can identify.

Using just pájaro here would sound incomplete in a normal sentence like this. Spanish generally wants a determiner such as el, un, mi, etc.

• El pájaro escapó ayer = The bird escaped yesterday
• Un pájaro escapó ayer = A bird escaped yesterday

Pájaro is a masculine noun, so it takes the masculine article el.

A good general rule is:

• nouns ending in -o are often masculine
• nouns ending in -a are often feminine

So:

• el pájaro
• el libro
• la casa

Biological sex and grammatical gender are not always the same thing. Pájaro is grammatically masculine as a word, even if the actual bird could be female.

Escapó is in the preterite tense: the simple past used for a completed action.

So escapó means:

• escaped
• got away

This tense is used because the action happened at a specific point in the past and is presented as finished.

Compare:

• escapó ayer = escaped yesterday → completed event
• escapaba = was escaping / used to escape → ongoing or habitual in the past

The accent mark shows that the stress falls on the last syllable: es-ca-PÓ.

Without the accent, escapo would mean I escape or I am escaping in the present:

• yo escapo = I escape / I’m escaping
• él escapó = he escaped

So the accent is important because it changes both the pronunciation and the meaning.

Pájaro is stressed on the first syllable: PÁ-ja-ro.

Spanish spelling rules say that words ending in a vowel, n, or s are normally stressed on the second-to-last syllable. Since pájaro ends in a vowel but is stressed earlier than expected, it needs a written accent.

So the accent tells you the correct stress:

• pájaro → PÁ-ja-ro

In Spain, the j is pronounced like a strong throaty sound, similar to the ch in Scottish loch or German Bach.

So pájaro sounds roughly like:

• PA-ha-ro, but with a harsher h sound

It is not pronounced like the English j in job.

Yes. Spanish word order is flexible, especially with time expressions like ayer.

These are all possible:

• El pájaro escapó ayer
• Ayer escapó el pájaro
• Ayer el pájaro escapó

The original sentence is the most neutral and straightforward. Putting ayer first can give it a little more emphasis, like Yesterday, the bird escaped.

Yes. Escapó and se escapó are both possible, though se escapó is very common.

In many contexts:

• escapó = escaped
• se escapó = escaped / got away

The version with se can sound a bit more like the bird managed to get loose or slip away. In everyday speech, many native speakers would naturally say El pájaro se escapó ayer.

So the sentence you have is correct, but se escapó is also very natural.

Spanish often leaves out subject pronouns because the verb ending already tells you the person.

Here, escapó already tells you it is:

• he escaped
• she escaped
• it escaped
• or a noun subject, like the bird escaped

Since el pájaro is already there, adding él would be unnecessary.

Yes, ayer is normally used by itself, without el.

• ayer = yesterday
• hoy = today
• mañana = tomorrow

So you say:

• escapó ayer not
• escapó el ayer

A rough pronunciation in Spain would be:

el PA-ja-ro es-ca-PO a-YER

More carefully:

• el
• PÁ-ja-ro
• es-ca-PÓ
• a-YER

A few key points:

• j in pájaro is a strong throaty sound
• the stress is on PÁ in pájaro
• the stress is on PÓ in escapó
• ayer is stressed on the second syllable: a-YER

That changes the meaning from a specific bird to an unspecified one.

• El pájaro escapó ayer = The bird escaped yesterday
• Un pájaro escapó ayer = A bird escaped yesterday

So el points to a known or identifiable bird, while un introduces one that is not specifically identified.