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O pai dele tem quarenta anos.

O pai dele tem quarenta anos.
His father is forty years old.
From Lesson 24:Counting by tens to 100 (trinta, quarenta...)·Portuguese (Portugal)

Questions & Answers about O pai dele tem quarenta anos.

Why does the Portuguese sentence use tem (has) instead of a verb for "is"?
In Portuguese, people don't be an age; they have years. Tem is the "he/she/it" form of the verb ter (to have). So, literally translated, this sentence says "His father has forty years."
How is the word for forty (quarenta) related to the word for four (quatro)?
Like most of the tens (from 40 to 90), it ends in -enta and is based on its root single digit. However, watch out for the spelling change! The "r" in quatro is dropped to form quarenta.
Why does the sentence say O pai dele to mean "his father"?
While there is a word for "his" (seu), it can also mean "your" and often causes confusion. To be perfectly clear, European Portuguese speakers usually prefer to use dele, which literally means "of him" (a mashup of de + ele). It always goes after the noun: pai dele (father of him).
Why is there an O (the) at the very beginning of the sentence?
In Portuguese, you almost always need to use a definite article (o or a, meaning "the") before talking about someone's relatives or when expressing possession. You are literally saying "The father of him".

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