Question 1

Is vedere entirely irregular in the passato remoto? How do we get vedemmo?

Accepted Answer

While vedere has highly irregular forms in this tense like vidi (I saw) and vide (he/she saw), the noi and voi forms follow the regular pattern. You just add the standard endings to the stem ved- to get vedemmo and vedeste.

Question 2

Why does dicemmo have a 'c' in it when the infinitive is dire?

Accepted Answer

The verb dire comes from the older Latin word dicere. In the passato remoto, the tu, noi, and voi forms use this old stem dic- and add regular endings, giving us dicesti, dicemmo, and diceste. The other forms use the irregular stem diss- (like dissi for I said).

Question 3

Both vedemmo and dicemmo end in -emmo. Is that ending standard?

Accepted Answer

Yes! The -emmo ending is the standard passato remoto ending for the noi form of -ere verbs. A great trick to remember is that even when an -ere verb is highly irregular in the passato remoto, its noi form almost always acts perfectly regular.

Question 4

I learned earlier that the plural of god is gli dei. Why does the singular use il instead of lo?

Accepted Answer

The singular word for god is just il dio, which uses the standard article il because it starts with a simple consonant. It is only in the plural that it becomes a strange exception, changing to dei and taking the article gli to become gli dei.

Vedemmo il dio, quindi dicemmo la verità.

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