Breakdown of Tenho medo do cão.
do
of the / from the (do, da, dos, das)
o cão
the dog
ter medo de
to be afraid of
Questions & Answers about Tenho medo do cão.
Why does the sentence start with tenho (I have) instead of a word for "I am"?
Where is the word for "I"?
In Portuguese, you can usually leave out subject pronouns like eu (I). Because the verb ending changes depending on who is doing the action, the word tenho already tells the listener that "I" am the one who has it. You only need to add eu if you really want to emphasize it.
How does do mean "of the"?
Do is a mandatory contraction, which means it combines two shorter words into one. It merges the preposition de (of) with the masculine "the" (o). Because cão (dog) is a masculine noun, we combine de + o to make do.
If I were afraid of multiple dogs, would the sentence change?
Yes! If you were afraid of dogs in plural (cães), the word for "the" changes to the plural os. When you combine de (of) with os (the), you get the contraction dos. The sentence would then be: Tenho medo dos cães.
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