Triggering the Immediate Past
The trapassato remoto shows that one event finished immediately before another past event. It almost always follows temporal conjunctions like:
- dopo che (after)
- appena (as soon as)
- non appena (as soon as)
In a sequence, the action that happens first takes the trapassato remoto. The action that immediately follows takes the standard passato remoto.
| As soon as the prince had broken the spell, the princess woke up. | Non appena il principe ebbe spezzato l'incantesimo, la principessa si svegliò. |
| After the witch had drunk the potion, she transformed the king. | Dopo che la strega ebbe bevuto la pozione, trasformò il re. |
Auxiliary Verbs Refresher
As with other compound tenses, choose avere or essere based on the main verb. With essere, the past participle agrees with the subject in gender and number.
| As soon as the giant had died, the hero took the throne. | Non appena il gigante fu morto, l'eroe prese il trono. |
Reflexive verbs always take essere.
| After the hero had put on the cloak, he broke the spell. | Dopo che l'eroe si fu messo il mantello, spezzò l'incantesimo. |
Sentence Order
The time clause containing the trapassato remoto often sits at the beginning of the sentence to set the scene, but you can flip the order without changing the meaning.
| The wolf died as soon as he had eaten the poisonous toad. | Il lupo morì appena ebbe mangiato il rospo velenoso. |
| The giant fell asleep after the fairy had blown him a kiss. | Il gigante si addormentò dopo che la fata gli ebbe mandato un bacio. |
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