Breakdown of Quiero pegar el pedazo que se ha roto.
querer
to want
que
that / than
romper
to break
se
(impersonal) one / passive marker
haber
(auxiliary) have
el pedazo
the piece
pegar
to glue
Questions & Answers about Quiero pegar el pedazo que se ha roto.
Why is it roto and not "rompido"?
Roto is the irregular past participle of the verb romper (to break). Instead of following the normal rule which would give us "rompido", it changes completely to roto. Since this is a very common irregular participle, you just have to memorize it!
Why is there a se before ha roto?
In English, objects can just "break", but in Spanish, the verb romper often uses the reflexive pronoun se when something breaks on its own, accidentally, or when we don't want to specify who broke it. You can think of se ha roto as meaning the piece "has broken itself".
I thought pegar meant "to hit". Why does it mean "to glue" here?
What verb does ha come from?
Ha comes from the helper verb haber (to have). In the present perfect tense, we combine a form of haber with a past participle like roto to talk about things that "have happened" or, in this case, a piece that "has broken".
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