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¿Qué mandó la chica?

¿Qué mandó la chica?
What did the girl send?
From Lesson 127:The preterite tense of -ar verbs (-é, -ó)·Spanish (Spain)

Breakdown of ¿Qué mandó la chica?

la chica
the girl
qué
what
mandar
to send

Questions & Answers about ¿Qué mandó la chica?

Why does mandó end in -ó?
Mandó is the past tense form of the verb mandar (to send) for él, ella, or usted. Because mandar is a regular -ar verb, you drop the -ar and add -ó to say that she sent something.
Why is the subject (la chica) at the end of the sentence?
In English questions, we use extra words like "did" to keep the normal word order ("What did the girl send?"). Spanish doesn't use these helper words. Instead, Spanish usually flips the verb and the subject in questions. So, the sentence is structured as ¿Qué mandó la chica? (literally "What sent the girl?").
Is the accent mark on mandó really necessary?
Yes, it is very important! The accent mark tells you to stress the final sound, and it proves the verb is in the past tense. If you leave it off, you get mando, which means "I send" right now in the present tense.
I thought mandar meant "to order". Why does it mean "to send" here?
Mandar can actually mean both! It is very commonly used to mean "to send" a message, a letter, or a package. You can usually guess which meaning is intended based on the context. Another common verb you might see for "to send" is enviar.

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