Learn Spanish (Latin America): El que ideó el concepto fue el inventor. - The one who devised the concept was the inventor.

El que ideó el concepto fue el inventor.

The one who devised the concept was the inventor.

Breakdown of El que ideó el concepto fue el inventor.

Questions & Answers about El que ideó el concepto fue el inventor.

Why use el que instead of just saying El inventor ideó el concepto?

This is a pseudo-cleft sentence, which is used to put a spotlight on the subject. While El inventor ideó el concepto simply states a fact, starting with El que builds anticipation and emphasizes that it was the inventor, and nobody else, who came up with it.

Could I use quien instead of el que here?

Yes, you can. Quien ideó el concepto fue el inventor means the exact same thing. When referring to people in this type of emphasizing sentence, el que (and its variations like la que) and quien are interchangeable.

Both ideó and fue are in the preterite past tense. Do the tenses always have to match?

They usually match, which is why fue is used alongside ideó. However, it is also grammatically correct to use the present tense for the verb to be here (El que ideó el concepto es el inventor) if you are treating the identity of the inventor as a timeless present fact.

Is the verb idear related to the noun idea?

Exactly! Idear is formed from the noun idea. It means to think up, devise, or invent something. Since it is a regular -ar verb, ideó is simply the third-person singular form in the preterite.