Breakdown of El rey sabía el secreto de la corona.
de
from / of
el secreto
the secret
saber
to know (facts) / to hear from (someone)
el rey
the king
la corona
the crown
Questions & Answers about El rey sabía el secreto de la corona.
Why is sabía used here instead of the preterite form supo?
In Spanish, mental verbs like saber (to know) shift their meaning slightly depending on whether you use the imperfect or preterite tense. The imperfect sabía means he already knew the secret—it was an ongoing state. If we used the preterite supo, it would mean he 'found out' or 'discovered' the secret at a specific moment in the past.
Could you use conocía instead of sabía since he 'knows' a secret?
I sometimes see de and el combine into del. Why doesn't that happen with de la?
The contraction del only happens when the preposition de is followed directly by the masculine singular article el (for example, el secreto del rey). It never combines with the feminine article la, the plural articles (los, las), or the pronoun él (he/him). So, de la corona must remain as three separate words.
Why does sabía have an accent mark on the í?
The accent mark breaks what would normally be a single syllable (a diphthong) into two separate sounds: sa-bí-a. Without the accent, the stress would naturally fall on the second-to-last syllable, making it sound like the word sabia (which means 'wise'). All regular -er and -ir verbs in the imperfect tense have this accented í in all of their conjugated forms.
Learn El rey sabía el secreto de la corona and more in Spanish
All course content and exercises are completely free — no paywalls, no trial periods, no signup needed.
- ✓ Practice with interactive exercises
- ✓ Track your progress with spaced repetition
- ✓Learn at your own pace — completely free