Question 1

Since this lesson is about cleft sentences, how would I rewrite this to emphasize that it was the scandal they had hidden?

Accepted Answer

You can turn this into a cleft sentence by putting a past-tense form of ser before the emphasized part, and lo que (what / that which) after it. To emphasize the scandal, you would say: Fue el escándalo lo que habían escondido por mucho tiempo. (It was the scandal that they had hidden for a long time).

Question 2

Why is it habían escondido instead of han escondido?

Accepted Answer

Habían escondido is the past perfect tense (they had hidden), which is used to talk about an action that happened before another point or action in the past. If you used han escondido (present perfect), it would mean "they have hidden," which describes a past action that continues to connect to the present.

Question 3

Why do we use por instead of para in por mucho tiempo?

Accepted Answer

You use por when talking about the duration of an action or how long a continuous state lasted (in this case, a long time). Para is generally used for specific deadlines, destinations, or purposes, not for measuring an amount of time that has passed.

Question 4

Is escondido an adjective here, and would it change to match a feminine or plural noun?

Accepted Answer

No, here escondido is the past participle functioning as part of the compound verb habían escondido. When a participle is used together with the auxiliary verb haber to form perfect tenses, it never changes its ending. It will always end in -o, regardless of the gender or number of the object being hidden.

Habían escondido el escándalo por mucho tiempo.

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