Breakdown of Il traffico era terribile, perciò ci siamo dovuti fermare.
essere
to be
il traffico
the traffic
dovere
must
fermarsi
to stop (moving)
perciò
therefore / for this reason
terribile
terrible
Questions & Answers about Il traffico era terribile, perciò ci siamo dovuti fermare.
Why do we use siamo instead of abbiamo with the modal verb dovere?
Why does the past participle change to dovuti instead of staying dovuto?
Whenever you use essere as your auxiliary verb in the passato prossimo, the past participle has to agree with the subject in gender and number. Since the subject is an implied 'we' (noi), dovuto becomes the plural dovuti. If 'we' referred to an all-female group, it would be dovute.
Could I attach ci to the end of the infinitive instead?
Yes, you can say fermarci. However, if you attach the pronoun to the end of the infinitive, the modal verb goes back to its normal auxiliary (avere), and the past participle no longer agrees with the subject. The clause would become: ...perciò abbiamo dovuto fermarci. Both versions are completely correct and common!
Why is era in the imperfect tense but siamo dovuti fermare is in the passato prossimo?
era sets the scene and describes a continuing background condition in the past (the traffic being terrible). siamo dovuti fermare describes a specific, completed action (the event of actually stopping) that resulted from that background state.
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