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Mentre guardavamo tutte le scimmie, sono arrivati tutti gli elefanti.

Mentre guardavamo tutte le scimmie, sono arrivati tutti gli elefanti.
While we were watching all the monkeys, all the elephants arrived.
From Lesson 164:The quantifier all (tutto il)·Italian

Breakdown of Mentre guardavamo tutte le scimmie, sono arrivati tutti gli elefanti.

essere
to be
guardare
to look at / to watch
arrivare
to arrive
tutto
all the / whole
mentre
while
la scimmia
monkey
l'elefante
elephant

Questions & Answers about Mentre guardavamo tutte le scimmie, sono arrivati tutti gli elefanti.

Why do we use tutte le scimmie and tutti gli elefanti instead of just tutte scimmie and tutti elefanti?
In Italian, you must always put the definite article (like le or gli) between the word for all (tutte or tutti) and the noun it describes. Even if English would just say all monkeys, Italian requires you to say all the monkeys.
How do I know whether to use tutte or tutti?
The word for all has to match the gender and number of the noun it describes. Scimmie (monkeys) is feminine plural, so it uses tutte (with the article le). Elefanti (elephants) is masculine plural, so it uses tutti (with the article gli).
Why does this sentence use guardavamo first, and then sono arrivati?
This sentence shows the difference between two past tenses. We use the imperfect tense (guardavamo, we were watching) to describe the continuous background action. We use the passato prossimo (sono arrivati, arrived) for the sudden, completed event that interrupted or happened during that time.
Why is the verb sono arrivati placed before the subject tutti gli elefanti?
While you could absolutely say tutti gli elefanti sono arrivati, Italian often flips the word order to emphasize the new information (the subject). Putting the subject at the end of the sentence is very common with verbs of motion like arrivare.
Why does arrivati end with an -i instead of an -o?
When forming the past tense (passato prossimo) with the helping verb essere (here, sono), the ending of the main verb must agree with the subject. Since tutti gli elefanti is masculine plural, the past participle arrivato changes to arrivati.

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