Learn Italian: La banda è scappata tra la folla. - The gang escaped through the crowd.

La banda è scappata tra la folla.

The gang escaped through the crowd.

Breakdown of La banda è scappata tra la folla.

Questions & Answers about La banda è scappata tra la folla.

Why is the past participle scappata singular, when a gang consists of multiple people?

In Italian, collective nouns like la banda (the gang) are treated as strictly singular, regardless of how many people they contain. Because la banda is a feminine singular noun, the auxiliary verb must be singular (è) and the past participle must end in -a (scappata) to agree with it.

Is la folla also treated as a strict singular noun like la banda?

Yes! La folla (the crowd) is another classic example of a human collective noun. Even though it represents many people, it is grammatically singular. If the crowd were doing the escaping, it would also be la folla è scappata.

Why does scappare use essere (è) as its helper verb instead of avere (ha)?

Scappare (to escape or run away) is a verb of motion that indicates a change of location. In Italian, most verbs describing this type of directional movement require essere to form the past tense.

I usually translate tra as "between" or "among". Why is it translated as "through" here?

While tra (and its identical twin fra) technically mean "between" or "among", English speakers naturally say "through the crowd" when describing movement. In Italian, you are literally saying the gang escaped "among" the crowd. Both translations describe the same physical situation.