Breakdown of Ele exigiu que os filhos herdassem toda a fortuna.
ele
he
o filho
the son
todo
all / whole
que
that (conjunction)
exigir
to demand
herdar
to inherit
a fortuna
the fortune
Questions & Answers about Ele exigiu que os filhos herdassem toda a fortuna.
Why is herdassem in the imperfect subjunctive here instead of the present subjunctive?
The main verb exigiu (he demanded) is a verb of influence, which triggers the subjunctive because it imposes a will on someone else. Since exigiu is in the past tense, the sequence of tenses rule kicks in: a past-tense trigger requires the following verb to be in the imperfect subjunctive (herdassem) rather than the present subjunctive (herdem).
How do you form the imperfect subjunctive herdassem from the verb herdar?
To form the imperfect subjunctive, you always start with the third-person plural of the simple past tense (Pretérito Perfeito): herdaram (they inherited). You drop the -ram ending to get your stem (herda-), and then add the imperfect subjunctive ending. For os filhos (they), the ending is -ssem, giving us herdassem.
Could we just use the infinitive here and say Ele exigiu os filhos herdar...?
Why is there an a in toda a fortuna? Doesn't toda already mean "all"?
In Portuguese, when you want to say "all the" or "the whole [noun]", you must include the definite article after todo or toda. So, toda a fortuna means "the whole fortune". If you left the article out (toda fortuna), it would mean "every fortune", which completely changes the meaning of the sentence!
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