Breakdown of Vim depressa, mas a cerimónia já tinha começado.
mas
but
ter
to have
a
to / at (direction)
começar
to begin
já
already
vir
to come
depressa
quickly, fast
a cerimónia
the ceremony
Questions & Answers about Vim depressa, mas a cerimónia já tinha começado.
Why do we use tinha começado here instead of the simple past tense?
tinha começado is the past perfect (pretérito mais-que-perfeito composto). You use it when you need to talk about a past action that happened before another past action. In this sentence, the ceremony starting happened before you arrived (vim).
How exactly do you form this tinha + past participle tense?
You take the imperfect tense of the auxiliary verb ter (to have) — which is tinha for the third-person singular — and add the past participle of your main verb. For a regular -ar verb like começar, you just drop the -ar and add -ado to get começado.
I always confuse vim and vi. Which verb is vim from?
It is a very common mix-up! Vim is the simple past tense (pretérito perfeito) of vir (to come) for the eu (I) form. The past tense of ver (to see) is vi. So here, vim means "I came", whereas vi would mean "I saw".
Could I put já at the end of the sentence, like we often do in English?
While people will definitely understand you, it sounds much more natural in Portuguese to put já (already) immediately before the verb phrase. Placing it right before tinha começado is the standard and most common word order.
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