Learn Italian: Credevo che la missione non fosse ancora iniziata. - I believed that the mission had not yet begun.

Credevo che la missione non fosse ancora iniziata.

I believed that the mission had not yet begun.

Breakdown of Credevo che la missione non fosse ancora iniziata.

Questions & Answers about Credevo che la missione non fosse ancora iniziata.

Why do we use the pluperfect subjunctive (fosse iniziata) instead of the past perfect indicative (era iniziata)?

The main verb Credevo (I believed) expresses a personal thought or opinion, which triggers the subjunctive. Since the main clause is in a past tense, and the mission not starting happened before that belief, we use the pluperfect subjunctive to show this earlier chronological timeframe.

Why is the auxiliary verb fosse (from essere) used here instead of avesse (from avere)?

The verb iniziare (to begin) takes essere as its auxiliary when it is used intransitively—meaning there is no direct object, and an event just starts on its own. If the sentence was about someone starting a specific thing (like "he had started the car"), you would use avere.

Why does the past participle end in -a (iniziata)?

Because the compound tense uses essere as its auxiliary verb (fosse), the past participle must agree in gender and number with the subject of the clause. The subject here is la missione, which is feminine singular, so iniziato changes to iniziata.

Why is ancora placed right in the middle of the verb?